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THE  MEMORY 


OF 


PAST  BIRTHS 


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CHARLES  JOHNSTON 


A* 


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X*  •  R  *  «k 
IVBRglTT 


THE  MEMORY  OF 


PAST  BIRTHS. 


BY 


Charles  Johnston,   M.  R.  A.  S. 

Bengal  Civil  Service,  Retired. 


THE  THEOSOPHICAL  SOCIETY 

Publishing  Department 
244  LENOX  AVENUE  NEW  YORK,  N.  Y. 

IRA  h 
KIVERglTT 


to®(rflll 


«?QPYRl»HT  1899  BY  IhE  METAPHYSICAL  PUBLISHING  Co. 


PREFACE. 


By  reading  the  title,  The  Memory  of  Past  Births,  you  have  already 
taken  the  first  step  towards  remembering,  for  you  have  sowed  in  your 
mind  the  seed  of  an  idea  which  will  germinate  and  grow  till  at  last  it 
blossoms  into  full  knowledge.  Of  those  who  receive  this  thought  of 
endless  life  through  many  births,  most  accept  it  at  once  with  a  convic- 
tion which  runs  ahead  of  evidence  ;  many  hold  it  tentatively  with 
gradually  growing  credence  ;  none  altogether  reject  or  forget  it.  The 
thought  remains,  the  seed  stirs  and  grows,  and  as  rebirth  is  a  true  law 
of  life,  every  turn  and  incident  of  life  gives  it  new  force,  till  at  last 
belief  ripens  into  certainty.  That  certainty  of  the  larger  life  wherein 
the  lives  and  deaths  of  this  our  world  are  but  as  days  and  nights, 
lightens  the  burden  of  death,  dulls  the  edge  of  sorrow,  takes  away  the 
terror  of  separation.  Immortality,  the  dearest  hope  in  every  human 
heart,  becomes  once  more  credible  and  intelligible  ;  nay  more,  demands 
and  compels  our  belief.  We  begin  to  catch  the  light  of  our  immortal 
selves,  the  gleam  from  beyond  the  heavens  which  shall  illumine  our 
hidden  past,  and,  still  greater  boon,  bring  clear  vision  of  the  path 
before  us,  winding  through  the  mists  and  shadows  of  the  valley,  till  it 

rises  at  last  into  the  everlasting  sunshine. 

C.  J. 


' 


. 


THE  MEMORY  OF   PAST  BIRTHS. 


CHAPTER    I. 
How   the   Teaching    Came. 

When  reincarnation  is  spoken  of,  one  question  is  invariably  raised 
— If  I  have  lived  before,  why  do  I  not  remember  it  ?  The  de- 
fenders of  reincarnation  almost  invariably  evade  this  question,  or  give 
vague  and  unsatisfactory  answers;  so  that,  while  almost  everyone 
who  once  grasps  the  thought  of  successive  lives  on  earth  feels  strongly 
inclined  to  adopt  it,  still  this  one  point  has  remained  a  stumbling- 
block,  and  in  all  the  years  reincarnation  has  been  talked  of  nothing 
definite  or  to  the  point  has  been  said  as  to  this  really  vital  question. 

The  idea  of  reincarnation  came  to  the  Western  world  only  a  few 
years  ago.  It  was  first  clearly  presented  in  an  attractive  and  sym- 
pathetic form  in  the  "Fragments  of  Occult  Truth"  which  Mme. 
Blavatsky  published  some  sixteen  or  seventeen  years  back  in  The 
Theosophist . 

The  idea  in  the  "  Fragments"  was  this:  To  understand  our  lives, 
to  know  what  lies  before  us  after  death  and  what  lay  behind  us,  before 
birth,  we  must  begin  by  a  better  understanding  of  ourselves.  We 
are  not  body  only,  but  soul  and  spirit  as  well — the  soul  half  earthly, 
half  heavenly ;   the  spirit,  as  yet,  almost  unknown  to  us. 

The  soul  is  everything  between  the  body  and  the  spirit — the  pas- 
sions, as  well  as  the  pure  will ;    the  desires,  as  well  as  the  love  of 

5 

**  TBI 

TJNIVKRSITT 


■SiCAUFO!^ 


beauty,  and  truth,  and  goodness.  To  the  lower  half  of  the  soul  the 
"Fragments"  gave  the  name:  the  Body  of  Desire,  while  its  higher 
half  was  called  the  Mind. 

The  soul  is  drawn  downward  toward  the  body  by  the  Body  of 
Desire,  and  then  the  animal  in  us  comes  out  and  fills  our  lives  with 
passions  and  appetites.  The  soul  is  drawn  upward  toward  the  spirit 
by  its  higher  part ;  then  genius,  and  power,  and  beauty,  and  faith 
are  developed — the  true  qualities  of  human  life.  In  the  fullness  of 
time,  death  comes.  What  happens  then?  or}  first,  what  has  happened 
at  the  moment  of  death? 

First,  the  body  has  been  separated  from  the  soul ;  the  body,  with 
all  that  network  of  instinctive  and  elemental  powers  in  it,  which  built 
it  up  and  carried  on  its  work  during  life,  and  which  now  pulls  it  to 
pieces  again,  in  dissolution.  But,  when  the  body  is  laid  aside,  the 
soul  is  not  all  pure,  any  more  than  it  was  a  day,  a  month  or  a  year 
before,  while  its  life  still  lasted  on  earth.  The  soul  has  its  worse  half 
still  clinging  to  it,  passions,  pictures  of  lust  and  appetite,  unsatisfied 
longings  for  sensuous  things,  and  the  sins  of  malice,  selfishness  and 
self-love,  which  make  up  so  much  of  ordinary  human  life. 

The  soul  is,  as  it  were,  surfeited  with  these  passions — clogged  like 
a  heavy  feeder  after  too  rich  a  meal.  It  cannot  rise  at  once  to  spir- 
itual life.  Almost  immediately  after  physical  death  the  soul  comes 
to  itself,  rid  of  its  pains  and  sickness,  and  with  a  feeling  of  lightness 
and  vigor,  resembling  the  vigor  of  keen  health  and  high  spirits.  The 
vesture  of  mortality  has  been  laid  aside,  but  there  is  often  no  clear 
consciousness  that  death  has  actually  taken  place,  and  this  only  comes 
after  repeated  attempts  to  talk  to  the  living  people  so  recently  left, 
who  are  still  vividly  present  to  the  person  just  dead. 

But  this  vivid  touch  with  earthly  life  lasts  for  a  few  hours  only, 
or  a  few  days  at  most ;  then  the  scenery  round  the  soul  begins  to 
change,  the  passions  and  desires  begin  to  assert  themselves  and  grad- 
ually work  themselves  out  through  a  period  of  purification,  which  is 
at  the  root  of  the  teaching  of  Purgatory.     The  spirit  draws  the  soul 


toward  its  strong,  pure  life;  but  the  soul,  overburdened  with  pas- 
sions, cannot  at  first  respond.  It  must  gradually  put  off  the  earthly 
desires,  and,  apparently,  is  still  in  contact  with  the  living  world,  in 
the  sense  that  it  has  a  consciousness  of  the  nearness  of  living  people. 
And  the  "  Fragments"  suggested  that  any  strong  bond  of  affection 
toward  people  still  in  the  world  would  keep  the  soul  of  the  dead  per- 
son close  to  them,  and  conscious  of  them ;  and,  so  far  as  lay  in 
the  power  of  the  soul,  it  would  help  and  protect  the  living. 

Then,  in  the  course  of  days,  or  months,  or  years,  according  to  the 
strength  of  its  earthly  desires,  the  soul  shakes  itself  free  from  its 
bondage  and  puts  off  the  Body  of  Desire.  The  passions  become 
latent  and  are  as  seeds  in  the  dried  and  withered  flower.  The  higher 
part  of  the  soul  is  drawn  back  into  the  spirit,  and  the  radiant  power 
and  strong,  pure  will  of  the  spirit  pour  into  it,  and  breathe  new  life 
and  vigor  into  the  soul's  dreams  of  beauty,  inspirations  of  goodness 
and  strivings  after  truth.  That  is  the  soul's  great  holiday  and  day 
of  refreshment,  when  all  the  pains  of  this  mortal  life  are  laid  aside. 

And  the  "  Fragments"  further  suggest  that,  as  our  spirits  are  far 
more  intimately  united  than  our  bodies,  so  the  souls  of  those  who  are 
truly  bound  together  are  keenly  conscious  of  that  bond  and  union,  in 
the  great  rest  they  enter  into,  when  the  Body  of  Desire  is  put  away. 
To  that  rest  of  the  soul,  the  "Fragments"  gave  the  name  of  De- 
vachan,  a  Tibetan  word  meaning  "  the  Blissful,"  and  one  well  known 
in  the  books  of  the  northern  Buddhists.  It  was  the  idea  of  Devachan 
more  than  any  other  teaching  which  made  the  fortune  of  the  '*  Frag- 
ments of  Occult  Truth."  There  was  something  in  this  teaching,  at 
once  so  reasonable  and  so  sublime,  so  unlike  the  material  heavens  of 
the  churches,  with  their  gold  and  stones,  their  trees  and  rivers,  and 
yet  something  so  satisfying  to  our  best  aspirations  that  one  could  not 
help  believing  that  something  like  it  must  be  the  truth. 

The  spirit  in  us,  standing  close  to  divinity,  has  a  power  and  im- 
mortal youth;  an  eternal  vigor,  that  is  the  very  heart  of  joy;  and  a 
wide  and  sweeping  knowledge  that  almost  reaches  omniscience.     As 


8 

the  soul  puts  away  its  garment  of  desires  it  rises  up  to  union  with  the 
spirit  in  Devachan,  the  Blissful,  and  is  thrilled  through  and  through 
with  the  spirit's  exultant  and  immortal  youth.  All  that  the  soul  had 
in  it,  of  beauty,  and  truth,  and  goodness,  is  kindled  into  rich  and  vig- 
orous life ;  all  aspirations  are  satisfied ;  all  hopes  of  heaven  are  ful- 
filled ;  all  dreams  of  joy  are  more  than  realized. 

Then  the  soul  bathes  in  the  waters  of  life,  and  is  strengthened 
and  refreshed.  As  the  measure  of  its  aspiration,  so  is  the  measure  of 
its  reward ;  every  hope  in  it,  every  seed  of  hope,  blossoms  out  into  a 
perfect  flower,  under  the  sunlight  of  the  spirit  and  its  vivifying  rays. 
And  as  the  souls  of  men  are  of  every  different  measure  of  aspira- 
tion, so  is  the  Blissful  Rest  different  for  each.  Every  soul  forms  its 
own  Devachan,  through  its  own  powers  and  energies,  reinforced  and 
strengthened  by  the  energies  of  the  spirit.  And  that  life  in  Devachan 
is  the  soul's  great  opportunity  to  rise  to  new  aspirations,  to  receive 
new  seeds  of  beauty  and  joy,  which  shall  in  their  turn  blossom  in  the 
time  to  come.  Drawn  thus  close  to  the  spirit,  the  soul  shares  the 
spirit's  greater  life  and  receives  the  seeds  of  hope,  the  ideals  of  future 
growth,  which  are  to  guide  and  stimulate  it  when  it  returns  again  to 
this  earthly  life. 

But  the  soul  does  not  only  receive  from  the  spirit,  it  also  gives  to 
the  spirit ;  brings  to  it  the  harvest  of  its  best  hours  in  life ;  the 
knowledge  it  has  won ;  the  sense  of  the  beauty  of  the  world ;  the 
sense  of  human  life,  with  its  loves  and  its  efforts ;  the  sense  of  toil 
well  done,  of  difficulties  overcome.  For  if  the  spirit  soars  angelic 
above  our  life  it  is  thereby  cut  off  from  many  a  secret  that  every 
mortal  knows;  and  these  are  the  messages  it  learns  from  the  soul  in 
return  for  the  power  and  peace  it  breathes  over  the  soul  in  paradise. 

That  paradise  of  peace  and  power  may  last  as  long  as  a  full  human 
life ;  it  may  last  thrice  as  long ;  no  years  are  given  for  us  to  measure 
it  by,  but  it  will  not  end  until  there  has  come  fullness  of  refreshing 
and  a  rest  from  the  memory  of  human  ills. 

The  radiance  of  rest  becomes  slowly  quiescent ;  the  overshadow- 


ing  light  and  power  of  the  spirit  become  dim  in  the  soul  which  has 
drowsed  itself  with  peace,  and  as  the  spirit  draws  away,  the  breath  of 
the  returning  earth  begins  to  stir  and  move  in  these  seeds  of  desire 
which  were  left  when  the  flower  of  the  last  earth  life  withered. 

Gradually  the  earth's  vitality  works  in  these  germs  of  desire,  of 
passion,  of  lust,  of  selfishness  and  self-love  till  the  soul  is  once  more 
tinged  and  colored  with  them,  and,  like  drawing  to  like,  enters  once 
more  the  confines  of  the  earth.  There  its  affinities  draw  it  to  that 
land,  and  class,  and  family  whose  life  is  most  in  harmony  with  its  own 
nature;  and,  uniting  itself  to  the  body  of  an  unborn  child,  it  pres- 
ently passes  again  through  the  gates  of  birth.  The  first  seeds  of 
earthly  things  to  come  to  full  life  in  it  are  the  elemental  and  simple 
powers  that  man  shares  with  the  animals,  almost  with  the  plants. 
Then,  gradually,  the  more  human  side  of  the  soul,  the  passions  as  well 
as  the  understanding,  come  to  their  growth,  and  a  full  return  to 
human  life  is  once  more  made.  Thus  come  childhood  and  youth  ;  and 
then  once  more,  age  and  death. 

The  "  Fragments  of  Occult  Truth,"  and  the  additions  made  to 
them  afterwards,  did  a  great  deal  more  than  merely  sketch  this  course 
of  a  single  human  life,  a  single  cycle  of  rebirth.  They  carried  the 
teaching  on  and  applied  it  to  the  whole  of  human  history,  even  sup- 
plying chapters  which  we  have  no  knowledge  of,  yet  which  seem  to 
have  a  certain  Tightness  and  reasonableness,  which  we  are  greatly 
inclined  to  admit. 

It  was  said  that  the  whole  development  of  humanity  had  been 
nothing  but  the  repeated  rebirths  of  the  same  human  souls;  that  we, 
who  now  live  and  breathe  the  vital  airs,  are  the  same  men  and  women 
who  lived  through  the  Middle  Ages,  the  days  of  chivalry  and  religious 
zeal,  in  France,  in  Spain,  in  Italy,  in  England ;  that  we  are  the  same 
men  and  women  who  peopled  heathen  Germany,  and  Scandinavia, 
and  Russia,  in  the  days  of  Thor,  and  Odin,  and  Perun ;  that  we  our- 
selves, and  no  others,  saw  the  fall  of  the  Roman  Republic,  the  de- 
generacy of    Greece,  the  last   days  of  the   Jewish   nation,. and  had, 


IO 

perhaps,  a  part  in  the  great  transition  that  passed  from  Judea  to  the 
Greek  and  Roman  worlds;  that  we  ourselves  played  a  part  in  the 
growth  of  Greece  and  Rome,  in  the  glad  old  strenuous  days  of  in- 
spiration and  liberty ;  that  we  have  opened  our  eyes  to  the  daylight, 
in  Assyria  and  Iran,  in  more  ancient  India,  and  Egypt,  and  Chaldea; 
and  in  older  days,  to  us  very  dim  and  mysterious,  but  bright  enough, 
and  real  enough,  while  we  actually  lived  them. 

Instead  of  going  back,  as  I  have  done,  the  "  Fragments  of  Occult 
Truth  "  began  at  the  utmost  horizon  of  the  past  and  came  down  to 
our  own  days,  outlining  no  less  than  four  great  races,  before  our  own 
epoch,  and  the  race  which  now  inhabits  the  earth.  The  first  two 
races  were  dim  and  shadowy  as  forgotten  dreams,  but  growing  grad- 
ually more  gross  and  material  as  the  long  ages  went  on.  Finally, 
with  the  third  race,  came  such  material  life  as  we  ourselves  are  used 
to,  though  much,  even  in  our  purely  animal  nature,  has  been  steadily 
modified  and  changed.  Of  this  third  race,  we  were  told,  there  are 
hardly  more  than  a  few  fragments  left,  and  those  debased  to  the 
utmost  limit  of  degeneration. 

The  fourth  race,  whose  memory  is  still  held  in  the  story  of  Atlan- 
tis, the  vanished  continent  now  hidden  beneath  the  waves,  sent  out 
many  races,  whose  descendants,  mingled  with  offshoots  of  the  earlier 
third  race,  inhabit  the  lands  and  continents  we  know.  From  the 
mingling  of  the  third  and  fourth  races  came  the  fifth,  our  present 
humanity — the  strong,  progressive  members  of  the  race.  Of  pure 
remnants  of  the  fourth  race  there  were,  we  were  told,  a  few  still  to 
be  found  among  the  inland  Chinamen,  who,  with  the  flat-headed 
aborigines  of  Australia,  were  relics  and  vestiges  of  a  vanished  past. 

The  third  race  had  natures  hardly  yet  fashioned  to  the  mould  of 
humanity  as  we  know  it ;  with  them  instinct  had  not  yet  become  pas- 
sion, nor  had  the  almost  automatic  acts  of  animal  life  yet  fully  changed 
to  conscious  reason.  They  were  blameless,  because  they  had  not 
reached  any  keen  sense  of  responsibility,  or  even  of  their  own  indi- 
vidual lives. 


II 


The  fourth  race  developed  a  strong  individualism,  and  with  it 
gained  great  power  over  nature:  a  conquest  of  material*  forces,  the 
metals,  the  powers  of  wood  and  stone,  of  iron  and  silver  and  gold. 
With  these  material  surroundings  came  a  hardening  of  the  inner 
nature  also,  and  the  faults  of  selfishness,  of  cruelty,  of  ambition. 
And  so  the  fourth  race  fell,  and  Atlantis  sank  in  the  ocean. 

Then  came  the  fifth  race,  with  its  task,  to  rise  again  from  material- 
ism ;  to  hold  the  consciousness  of  the  fourth  race  and  the  sense  of 
individual  life,  but  without  cruelty  or  too  keen  self-love ;  to  regain 
the  innocence  of  the  third  race,  without  its  ignorance,  and  to  add  new 
powers  and  perfections  undreamed  of  in  the  earlier  world.  In  that  fifth 
race  is  our  own  place,  and  that  destiny  is  being  unfolded  in  us. 

To  the  fifth  race  are  to  follow  others,  each  adding  something  new 
and  excellent,  until  mankind  is  perfected ;  and  when  this  cycle  of  life 
is  ended,  and  this  earth  of  ours  is  ended  with  it,  there  are  other 
greater  cycles  and  nobler  worlds  on  which  we,  the  self-same  souls, 
are  destined  to  find  our  fuller  growth,  our  larger  joy. 

Thus  the  "  Fragments"  suggested  to  us  our  place  in  a  great  and 
orderly  development,  all  the  races  of  our  planet  filling  parts  in  the 
same  scheme,  each  supplementing  the  others  and  bringing  some 
power,  or  skill,  or  knowledge,  or  instinct  to  the  total  sum,  which 
without  it  would  have  been  by  that  much  deficient. 

Each  of  us,  we  were  told,  had  passed  through  every  race,  and 
time  and  clime;  we  were  the  Chaldeans,  the  Egyptians,  the  Indians; 
we  were  the  ancient  Romans,  the  Greeks,  the  men  of  the  Dark  Ages; 
of  the  Renaissance,  of  modern  days.  And  thus,  once  more,  we  were 
brought  to  the  question :  If  we  really  had  such  ripe  and  abundant 
experience,  how  is  it  that  we  remember  of  it  not  a  single  fragment ; 
not  one  colored  patch  of  the  Nile,  or  the  Euphrates;  not  a  single 
Atlantean  day;   no  memory  of  Babylon,  or  the  Khalifs,  or  Chivalry? 

This  question  was  answered  in  a  sense,  but  the  answer  was  not 
satisfactory,  or,  at  any  rate,  it  had  nothing  like  the  clearness  and 
definiteness  which  won  such  instant  recognition  for  the  teachings  of 


12 

the  "  Fragments,"  especially  when  they  appeared  in  a  volume,  with 
many  additions,  as  "  Esoteric  Buddhism."  Still,  in  this  great  and 
wonderful  scheme  of  the  races  there  was  much  to  commend  itself 
veiy  strongly,  even  though  it  could  hardly  be  verified  or  proved  in 
any  positive  way. 

There  was,  first  of  all,  in  proof  of  our  identity  with  the  men  of 
those  old  races,  our  keen  interest  and  understanding  of  their  works 
and  ways ;  the  infinite  patience,  the  infinite  eagerness,  with  which  we 
strive  to  decipher  every  fragmentary  sign  and  inscription  they  have 
left ;  and  the  fact,  too,  that  we  can  decipher  these  old  sign-pictures, 
though  they  seem  obscure  as  the  riddles  of  the  gods.  Everything  in 
the  life  of  all  races  and  all  times  is  vividly  akin  to  us ;  even  the  holi- 
day crowds  in  the  museums  are  constantly  bearing  witness  to  our 
affinity  with  the  days  and  the  lands  that  are  dead. 

Then  again,  the  scheme  of  the  "  Fragments"  made  more  intelli- 
gible the  lingering  presence  of  low  and  abject  races  among  us,  like  the 
Bushmen,  the  Veddahs,  or  the  Australians.  These  are  the  dwellings 
of  belated  souls,  laggards  in  the  race,  who  have  yet  certain  lessons  to 
learn,  that  nothing  but  the  wild  life  of  these  wanderers  could  teach 
them.  And  when  the  laggards  have  learned  their  lesson  the  belated 
races  will  assuredly  disappear.  As  there  are  souls  in  all  stages  of 
growth,  as  souls  are  many-sided  things,  so  must  there  be  many  races 
of  many  kinds — white  and  yellow,  red  and  black — to  give  them  the 
scope  and  opportunity  they  require.  And  we  can  never  tell  how 
lately  we  ourselves  inhabited  other  colored  skins.  So  we  should  be 
very  tolerant  in  this  matter  of  color. 

Once  more,  we  find  that  the  races  supplement  each  other  in  a 
marvelous  way ;  that  the  work  of  the  temple-builders  of  Egypt  was 
carried  on,  and  perfected,  not  in  Egypt,  but  in  Greece ;  that  the 
chants  of  the  Persian  fire-worshippers  have  won  a  new  life  on  the  lips 
of  Christian  choirs;  that  the  thoughts  of  the  old  Indian  sages  were 
caught  up  and  given  a  beauty  and  vivid  grace,  by  Pythagoras  and 
Plato ;   that  the  work  of  Praxiteles  and  Apelles  was  handed  down  to 


13 

Raphael  and  Titian ;  that  Michael  Angelo  is  the  kin  of  Phidias ;  that 
Euripides  wrote  for  Racine ;  that  ./Eschylus  was  the  prophecy  of 
Shakespeare.  And  that,  in  one  and  all,  there  was  something  added ; 
a  new  development ;  a  fresh  unfolding  of  the  leaves  of  the  flower  of 
humanity,  that,  like  the  blue  champaka,  shall  one  day  bloom  in 
Paradise.  So  all  races  supplement  each  other ;  none  has  a  perfect 
gift ;  but  each  lends  aid  to  every  other.  In  this  way,  too,  we  see 
how  wise  it  is  to  look  on  the  whole  human  race  as  but  one  great 
assemblage  of  souls,  ever  perfecting  the  great,  mysterious  work. 

There  is  for  the  whole  race  and  for  each  of  us  a  certain  path  to  be 
trod :  a  certain  large  and  perfect  growth  to  be  reached ;  a  gradual 
development,  through  endless  change.  And  it  follows,  in  the  sim- 
plest way,  that  the  position  of  any  one  on  the  great  path  depends 
very  definitely  on  the  distance  he  has  already  traveled ;  if  he  has 
gone  so  far,  in  the  days  that  are  dead,  he  is  now  at  such  a  place ;  if 
he  has  lagged,  he  is  further  back;  the  strenuous  and  courageous  are 
further  in  advance.  So,  where  we  shall  be  to-morrow,  a  year  hence, 
or  ten  years  hence,  depends  on  where  we  are  to-day,  and  whether  we 
still  keep  moving.  And  we  see,  very  clearly,  that  races  and  men  get 
on  by  their  own  works,  and  not  by  the  works  of  others ;  every  one 
must  do  his  own  walking  on  the  world's  great  way ;  there  is  no  such 
thing  as  hiring  substitutes.  So  that  we  may  say  of  the  life  of  any  one, 
that  his  position  is  pretty  strictly  and  justly  due  to  his  own  walking 
in  bygone  days,  and  that  his  position  to-morrow  will  depend  on  the 
use  he  makes  of  to-day.  We  build  our  own  lives;  we  are  our  own  for- 
tunes ;  we  weave  our  destinies  for  ourselves.   This  is  the  law  of  Karma. 

There  are  parts  of  this  great  law  of  Karma  that  we  should  like  to 
linger  over;  above  all,  the  matter  of  sex,  and  the  great  question  of 
poverty  and  riches.  Of  the  first,  the  teachers  of  the  "Fragments" 
suggest  that  all  souls,  to  gain  perfect  experience,  must  live  the  life  of 
both  the  sexes ;  just  as  each  of  us  must  in  every  life  inherit  childhood, 
youth  and  maturity ;  just  as  each  of  us  must  taste  both  birth  and 
death.     As  to  poverty  and  riches,  the  question  is  too  large  to  touch  en 


here ;   but  we  must  rest  assured  that  here,  too,  essential  justice  is  done. 

We  should  try  to  see  the  matter  in  this  light :  There  is  but  one 
great  assembly  of  human  souls ;  all  are  alive  at  this  moment ;  none 
of  them  are  belated  or  caught  in  the  net  of  bygone  ages;  all  are 
present  in  the  life  of  to-day.  But  of  these,  a  quarter,  perhaps,  are 
now  embodied  on  the  earth ;  three-fourths  are  hidden  in  the  heavens, 
in  the  paradise  of  peace,  or  in  the  dim  halls  of  desire,  through  which 
men's  souls  pass  on  their  journey  back  and  forth  from  outward  life. 

And  this  same  assembly  of  souls  was  present  through  all  the  yes- 
terdays of  the  world,  and  will  be  present  in  every  to-morrow.  Our 
life  is  one  great  life,  of  which  we  are  all  parts ;  time  is  our  pathway, 
and  the  whole  earth  our  inheritance. 

Yet  that  question  obstinately  recurs:  If  I,  who  move  and  live  in 
the  world  to-day,  who  get  such  sincere  satisfaction  out  of  life  and  all 
experiences,  have  indeed  passed  through  so  rich  and  varied  days  and 
years  and  lives,  why  does  no  memory  of  it  all  remain?  Why  can  I 
not  recall  how  I  tilted  in  the  lists  in  mediaeval  days ;  how  I  prayed 
in  Gothic  cathedrals;  how  I  hunted  the  deer  through  gloomy  Ger- 
manic forests ;  how  I  shouted  for  Caesar  or  Brutus  in  the  Forum  ;  how 
I  saw  the  plays  of  Sophocles,  and  heard  old  Homer  sing?  What  has 
become  of  my  lotus  garlands  of  Egypt,  my  part  in  the  old  temple 
processions  on  the  Nile,  my  share  in  the  sermons  of  Gautama,  or  the 
caves  of  Ellora  and  Elephanta?  If  I,  indeed,  and  no  other,  moved 
in  the  days  of  Atlantis,  where  the  seas  now  roll,  or  in  yet  older  lands, 
where  the  sand-storms  sweep  over  desert  Tarim  and  Gobi ;  if  I  shared 
the  fate  of  dim,  gigantic  races,  before  Atlantis  was,  why  can  I  not 
recall  a  day  of  it?  Why  is  my  memory  as  empty  of  purple  hours  as 
a  beggar's  cloak  in  the  rain? 

What  said  the  "Fragments"?  Well,  they  answered  something 
like  this :  The  memories  of  all  those  past  births  are  still  in  your  pos- 
session, every  one  of  them ;  but  they  are  hid  and  carefully  packed 
away  in  remote  corners  of  your  being,  whither  you  hardly  find  your 
way,  even  in  dreams.     But  when  the  day  of  attainment  dawns  for 


is 

you,  those  memories  shall  be  yours;   at  the  end  of  the  way  you  will 
be  able  to  look  back  to  all  past  stages  of  your  journey. 

Well,  that  was  satisfactory  enough  in  a  way ;  and  yet,  with  all 
that,  pretty  unsatisfying.  We  do  not  feel  like  waiting  for  the  day  of 
our  attainment,  at  the  end,  perhaps,  of  the  seventh  race ;  we  should 
like  to  realize  a  little  of  all  that  great  wealth  of  ours ;  like  the  Friend 
from  India,  on  whom  every  one  was  pressing  hundred-dollar  checks, 
we  feel  as  though  we  should  like  a  quarter  in  hard  cash,  on  account. 

This  is  clearly  the  most  interesting  point  of  the  whole  question : 
The  memory  of  past  births ;  and  we  should  like  to  learn  something 
more  definite  about  it.  Now,  as  it  happens,  there  is  a  good  deal  that 
may  be  learned.  All  the  world,  including  even  the  Christian  world 
at  one  time,  has  held  to  this  great  teaching  of  Reincarnation,  and  all 
the  world  has  run  up  against  this  fascinating  and  exasperating  ques- 
tion of  lost  memory.  It  has  been  thought  out  in  India,  in  Egypt,  in 
Greece,  in  Italy.  And  I  think  I  shall  be  doing  a  good  work  in  bring- 
ing together  the  chief  passages  that  bear  on  the  subject,  from  the 
Upanishads,  from  Buddha,  from  Plato,  from  Synesias,  from  Virgil. 
They  have  all  had  something  to  say ;  and  it  has  generally  been  well 
worth  saying. 

I  shall  add  the  testimony  of  the  living  to  the  witness  of  the  dead ; 
we  may  be  lesser  than  the  admired  sages ;  but  we  have  this  advantage, 
that  we  are  here,  at  the  moment,  and  hold  the  stage  in  the  present 
hour.  Though  that  thought  of  the  ever-living  assembly  of  souls, 
one-fourth  manifest  on  earth,  three-fourths  hidden,  yet  none  the  less 
living,  in  the  heavens,  should  warn  us  against  speaking  slightingly 
of  the  mighty  dead. 

Let  me  anticipate  for  a  moment,  and  say  that  to  our  question, 
Why  do  we  not  remember  our  past  births?  we  shall  get  this  answer 
uniformly  from  the  ages — A  good  many  do  and  always  have  remem- 
bered. 


CHAPTER  II. 
The   Tradition  of  the   East. 

The  teaching  of  past  births  comes  to  us  from  the  East,  and  most 
of  all  from  India.  How  then  did  the  Indian  teachers  face  the  problem 
which  we  have  spoken  of — the  blank  pages  of  memory  for  all  the 
illimitable  past  which  was  unrolled,  before  our  latest  descent  through 
the  gates  of  birth?  Why  do  we  not  remember  our  past  births,  in  the 
view  of  the  Indian  sages? 

To  answer  this  question,  we  shall  have  to  ask  the  one  which  pre- 
cedes it,  namely,  What  did  the  sages  of  India  teach  concerning  rebirth ; 
and  what  is  it  they  conceived  as  reborn?  And  we  can  do  this  best 
and  most  satisfactorily  by  taking  in  their  order  the  passages  in  the 
Indian  sacred  books  in  which  rebirth  is  taught. 

To  begin  with,  we  are  met  by  a  very  general  misconception,  which 
practically  runs  through  all  that  has  been  written  by  students  of 
Indian  lore :  the  belief  that  we  owe  the  teaching  of  rebirth  to  the 
Brahmans,  the  great  hereditary  caste  of  priests  and  scholars  who  loom 
so  large  on  the  Indian  horizon,  and  who  have  kindled  the  imaginations 
of  so  many  generations  of  foreigners  visiting  India  in  search  of  secret 
wisdom.  By  looking  deeper  into  the  Indian  books  we  shall  find 
that,  so  far  from  originating  the  teaching  of  rebirth,  the  Brahmans  for 
the  whole  first  period  of  their  history  confessedly  knew  nothing  about 
it ;  that  it  was  already  well  known  even  then  to  another  race  in  India, 
and  that  it  was  taught,  on  a  definite  historic  occasion,  by  this  other 
race  to  the  Brahmans. 

The  older  race  who  taught  the  Brahmans  was  a  red  race,  kin  to 

16 


*7 

the  inhabitants  of  ancient  Egypt  and  Chaldea ;  and  it  is  among  the 
descendants  of  this  red  race  that  we  find  the  clearest  conception  of 
rebirth,  and  of  the  whole  teaching  which  makes  up  the  subject  of  the 
Mysteries,  From  whom  this  ancient  race  received  its  tradition,  we 
cannot  tell;  but  the  suggestion  constantly  put  forward,  in  India  as  in 
Egypt,  is  that  their  teachers  were  a  race  of  demigods,  or  divine  beings 
in  human  form ;  the  representatives  of  man  before  the  fall ;  and  that 
from  this  divine  race,  the  teaching  of  rebirth  has  been  handed  down 
in  unbroken  succession  to  the  present  day.  And  for  this  reason  we 
have  the  teaching  of  rebirth  complete,  even  though  there  is  no  vestige 
of  memory  of  their  beginningless  past  in  the  minds  of  those  who  are 
born  into  the  world. 

The  books  which  contain  the  tradition  of  the  Mysteries,  as  handed 
down  to  India  by  one  branch  of  the  old  red  race,  are  called  the 
Upanishads :  that  is,  the  Books  of  Secret  Teachings,  or  Hidden  Wis- 
dom ;  and  there  are  two  chief  passages  'n  the  Upanishads  which  deal 
with  the  teaching  of  rebirth.  The  first  of  these  is  in  a  passage  which 
is  traditionally  known  as  the  Lore  of  the  Five  Fires ;  because,  in  it, 
the  worlds  above  this,  through  which  the  soul  passes  in  its  descent 
into  birth,  are  spoken  of  as  fires.  There  is,  first  of  all,  the  higher 
celestial  world,  the  paradise  of  peace,  where  the  soul  has  rested 
through  long  years,  after  its  last  birth ;  and  in  this  world,  the  soul  is 
an  immortal  and  angelic  being,  above  the  waves  of  birth  and  death, 
free  from  the  shadow  of  sorrow  and  pain.  When  the  time  for  the  new 
birth  comes,  we  are  told,  the  gods  offer  up  the  soul  as  a  sacrifice  in 
the  fire  of  the  celestial  world,  and  from  this  sacrifice,  the  lunar  lord 
is  born.  This  is  a  simple  allegory  in  the  old  mystery  language:  the 
gods  who  offer  up  the  soul  are  its  own  inherent  powers,  its  unfulfilled 
destinies,  its  attractions  to  other  beings  alive  on  this  earth,  its  own 
thirst  for  further  physical  life ;  these  offer  it  as  a  sacrifice ;  dying  out 
of  the  celestial  world,  it  is  born  into  the  psychic  world,  the  midworld 
between  earth  and  heaven. 

The  lunar  lord  is  the  psychic  body ;   and  all  through  the  mystery 


18 

teachings  the  moon  is  used  as  the  symbol  of  the  psychical  world. 
This  in  part  because  the  moon,  as  cause  of  the  tides,  is  regent  of 
the  waters — the  waters  being  the  commonest  symbol  of  the  psychic 
realm,  and  in  part  because  the  waxing  and  waning  of  the  moon  repre- 
sent the  great  law  of  alternation,  which  rules  everything  psychic,  and 
appears  in  our  human  life  in  the  alternating  emotions  of  pleasure  and 
pain,  hope  and  fear,  sorrow  and  joy.  The  lunar  lord  is  the  psychic 
body,  the  personal  self,  who  lives  through  the  life  of  the  emotions, 
and  whose  keen  sense  of  being  is  due  wholly  to  the  alternation  of 
emotion ;  since  any  one  emotion  continued  indefinitely  would  bring 
a  sense  of  numbness,  of  total  absence  of  that  keen  feeling  which  is  the 
very  life  of  the  personal  self.  Therefore  sorrow  and  fear  are  as  much 
the  food  of  the  personal  self  as  are  hope  and  pleasure ;  since  the  one 
can  never  be  separated  from  the  other. 

From  the  psychic  world,  the  borderland  between  earth  and  heaven, 
the  soul  passes  downwards  to  the  physical  world,  which  13  called  the 
third  fire,  through  the  intermediation  of  human  parents,  who  are  the 
remaining  two  of  the  five  fires.  To  enter  into  a  fuller  explanation  of 
this  symbolism  of  the  fires,  and  the  part  they  play  in  birth,  would 
carry  us  away  too  far  from  the  main  theme ;  but  it  may  be  said 
that  this  apprehension  of  bodily  life  as  a  fire,  or  radiant  energy,  and 
its  further  analysis  according  to  the  color  of  the  flames,  is  a  part  of 
symbolism  which  runs  through  the  whole  tradition  of  the  Mysteries, 
from  the  remotest  ages  to  the  present  day. 

In  the  passage  we  are  quoting  from,  the  actual  earthly  life  of  man 
is  embraced  within  a  sentence  as  brief  as  an  epitaph:  He  lives  as  long 
as  he  lives,  and  so  he  dies.  Then  we  come  to  the  brief  description 
of  the  Indian  rite  of  burning  the  body,  and  we  are  told  that  the  soul 
rises  from  the  pyre  in  a  vesture  the  color  of  the  sun,  and  passes 
upwards  again  through  the  three  worlds. 

And  here  we  are  met  by  another  great  part  of  the  mystery  teach- 
ing: the  teaching  of  the  difference  of  destiny  after  death.  There 
are  in  reality  three  paths  open  for  the  soul  which  has  just  left  the 


19 

body,  and  these  three  paths  depend  wholly  on  its  inherent  quality  and 
spiritual  treasure  and  attainment.  For  those  whose  imaginations 
have  been  wholly  set  upon  earthly  life,  and  who  have  never  caught  a 
glimpse  of  the  Beyond,  nor  any  gleam  of  the  celestial  light  that  shines 
to  us  from  the  back  of  the  heavens,  their  destiny  is,  to  be  born  again 
almost  without  an  interval ;  to  begin  a  new  earth-life,  as  soon  as  the 
former  earth-life  is  ended. 

Those  who  have  been  full  of  aspiration,  of  religious  longings  for 
happiness  in  a  better  world ;  whose  imaginations  have  been  full  of 
pictures  of  heaven  and  glory  to  be  won  and  enjoyed  by  themselves, 
are  carried  upward  on  the  strong  stream  of  their  aspirations,  and 
ascend  once  more  through  the  regions  of  the  psychic  world,  in  their 
order  according  to  their  remoteness  from  earth  and  nearness  to  the 
higher  and  more  spiritual  worlds.  Their  aspirations  are  a  body  of 
forces,  as  definite  as  those  wrapped  up  in  the  seed  of  a  tree,  which 
will  bring  forth  an  oak,  a  beech,  or  an  elm,  according  to  their  inherent 
character,  and  thus  give  birth  to  a  life  that  may  endure  for  generations. 
And,  as  the  whole  growth  of  a  huge  forest-tree  is  stored  up  in  a 
minute  seed,  and  lies  hidden  there,  in  a  web  of  invisible  forces,  so  the 
soul  carries  its  future  with  it,  in  the  germs  of  its  aspirations  and 
desires. 

But  these  aspirations  and  desires  were  formed  for  the  personal  self 
by  the  personal  self,  and  therefore  they  are  not  devoid  of  the  element 
of  egotism,  of  self-centeredness;  they  cling  around  the  personal 
self,  and  depend  on  it.  And  they  are  mixed  with  other  desires, 
for  more  material  happiness,  for  more  earthly  joys,  to  be  satisfied 
only  by  a  new  return  to  earth.  So  that  the  soul  full  of  religious 
aspiration  for  the  personal  bliss  is  yet  bound ;  it  has  not  escaped  the 
cycle  of  necessity,  the  law  of  repeated  birth.  Drawn  up  by  its 
aspirations  to  the  verge  of  the  celestial  world,  it  is  irradiated  by  the 
spiritual  light,  and  opens  and  expands  in  that  light  as  a  flower 
expands  in  the  sunshine.  Then  for  generations  or  ages  it  bathes  in 
the  joys  of  satisfied  aspiration,  with  a  full  sense  of  personal  bliss  and 


20 

illumination,    until  the  hour  strikes  for  it  to  be  born  again.     This 
comes  when  the  store  of  aspirations  and  upward  longings  is  worn  out, 

\  expanded  like  the  life  of  a  tree,  full  grown  and  ready  to  fall,  and  so 
the  soul  falls  again  through  the  realms  of  the  psychic  world,  and 
passes  back  again  through  the  gates  of  birth,  to  begin  once  more  the 
cycle  of  earthly  life. 

Here  we  see  one  reason  for  lapse  of  memory,  for  the  blank  pages 
of  the  new-born  soul.  For  at  the  moment  of  death,  its  mind-images 
were  of  two  kinds,  spiritual  and  material ;  and  the  force  which  was 
locked  up  in  the  spiritual  thoughts  has  already  been  released  and 
exhausted  in  the  long  rest  of  paradise,  bearing  its  fruit  there,  in 
a   splendid    vision  woven  of    the    very    best  of    the  life   just  lived. 

•>•-»  The  material  mind-images  have  remained  latent  during  the  repose 
of  paradise,  and  in  the  form  of  germs  of  force,  comparable  to 
the  tree  while  yet  in  the  seed,  they  await  the  returning  soul, 
and  join  it  as  it  approaches  the  gates  of  birth.  These  material 
images  and  tendencies  form  the  forces  which  impel  the  soul  into 
its  new  body,  and  which  spin  themselves  into  the  web  of  a  new 
bodily  life,  thus  exhausting  themselves  just  as  the  spiritual  forces 
exhausted  themselves  in  paradise.  Thus  it  seems  that  the  memories 
of  former  births,  whether  spiritual  or  material,  whether  of  aspiration 
or  desire,  are  actually  worked  into  the  substance  of  a  new  existence 
on  this  earth  or  in  paradise ;  so  that  they  no  longer  exist  in  the  form 
of  memories,  and  cannot  therefore  be  remembered,  in  the  same  way 
as  we  remember  the  events  of  the  day  before  yesterday.  They  are 
not  present  as  memories,  in  the  sphere  of  the  new  personality,  just 
as  what  happens  to  a  father  is  not  present  in  the  memory  of  his  son, 
though  it  may  and  does  work  most  vitally  through  the  son's  life. 

To  take  a  simple  simile,  and  one  which  is  thoroughly  in  harmony 
with  the  language  of  the  Mysteries,  throughout  all  ages,  and  in  all 
lands.  The  former  life  is  like  a  plant,  which  completes  its  growth, 
and  reaches  maturity.  It  comes  into  flower,  and  all  the  essence  of 
the  plant  is  transformed  and  glorified  in.  the  blossom,  with  new  and 


21 

splendid  coloring,  form,  and  odor — all  strange  to  the  plant,  and  yet 
formed  of  its  essence.  This  flowering  is  the  life  in  paradise  where, 
under  the  radiance  of  the  spiritual  sun,  all  that  was  best  and  most 
vital  in  the  soul  is  transformed  and  expanded  into  a  glorious  life,  and 
puts  forth  new  and  spiritual  powers  quite  strange  to  the  natural  man, 
and  yet  springing  from  his  being,  or  rather  from  that  being  and 
inwardly  working  soul  which  has  put  forth  the  mortal  man  into  the 
human  world. 

But  the  matter  does  not  end  with  the  flower ;  there  are  the  seeds 
also ;  and  these  seeds  will  in  due  time  bring  forth  a  second  plant  of 
like  nature  with  the  first,  and  ready  in  its  turn  to  burst  into  splendid 
bloom.  The  seeds  are  the  material  germs  which  rest  within  the  soul 
in  paradise,  and,  when  its  time  of  blossoming  is  done,  bring  it  back 
again  through  the  gates  of  birth.  And  seedtime  and  harvest  go  on 
forever.  So  is  it  with  the  life  of  man.  But,  as  the  former  plants 
are  not  present  except  in  spirit,  in  the  new  plant,  so  the  former  lives 
are  not  present  in  the  form  of  material  memories,  which  might  be 
recalled  like  the  events  of  a  few  days  or  months  ago. 

There  is  yet  a  third  destiny :  the  path  of  Liberation ;  and  this, 
rather  than  the  way  of  rebirth,  is  the  essence  of  the  Upanishads,  and 
of  the  whole  Mystery  teaching.  Instead  of  faring  forth  along  the 
cycle  of  necessity,  there  is  another  destiny  open  to  the  soul,  and  this 
its  own  true  and  proper  destiny.  The  soul  is  not  by  right  a  timeless 
wanderer,  but  a  present  immortal;  a  divine  and  creative  being;  an 
undivided  part  of  the  everlasting  Eternal.  And  it  is  within  the  will 
of  every  man  at  any  time  to  claim  his  heritage ;  to  pass  out  from  the 
ranks  of  men  who  die  to  be  reborn,  and  to  join  the  host  of  the 
immortals,  and  share  in  the  wisdom  and  power  of  the  Divine.  And 
this  entry  through  the  doorway  of  the  Sun  is  the  true  Initiation  into 
the  Greater  Mysteries,  an  initiation  which  finds  man  mortal,  and 
leaves  him  an  immortal. 

For  those  who  have  passed  through  the  door  of  the  Sun  there  is 
no  return ;   their  destiny  lies  elsewhere ;   they  are  no  longer  on  the 


22 

path  of  the  Fathers;  they  have  entered  the  pathway  of  the  Gods. 
The  whole  message  of  the  Upanishads  is  the  discovery  of  this  way,. 
the  tradition  of  it,  and  of  the  powers  and  immortality  it  brings. 
And  it  is  only  as  leading  up  to  this  higher  way,  that  the  teaching  of 
rebirth  has  a  place  in  the  Upanishad  teaching. 

And  now  we  come  once  again  to  the  question  of  the  memory  of 
past  births.  We  can  trace  a  strong  and  unchanging  tradition  all 
through  the  books  of  the  Mysteries,  to  the  effect  that  one  of  the  first 
fruits  of  the  higher  way,  of  the  true  initiation  into  life,  is  a  memory 
of  former  births,  down  to  the  minutest  and  most  distant  details.  In 
the  Upanishads  this  teaching  is  rather  present  by  implication  than 
explicitly  stated;  it  is  said,  again  and  again,  that  he  who  has  entered 
into  the  Self,  and  thereby  become  immortal,  knows  all  things;  that 
he  is  lord  of  what  has  been  and  what  shall  be ;  that  he  shares  in  all 
the  wisdom  of  the  Eternal.  But,  in  the  great  Upanishads,  the 
particular  command  of  the  past  implied  in  a  knowledge  of  former 
births  is  not  definitely  mentioned,  though  we  can  easily  trace  the 
tendencies  which  make  it  an  inevitable  conclusion. 

It  is  only  when  we  come  to  the  first  great  Indian  revival  of  the 
Mystery  teaching,  under  Krishna,  that  we  have  a  clear  and  explicit 
statement  of  the  fact  that  this  memory  of  past  births  is  real.  The 
tradition  of  India  places  this  revival  at  a  point  just  five  thousand  years 
ago;  and  it  is  constantly  suggested  that  there  is  a  definite  and  precise 
cyclic  relation  between  that  period  and  the  present  day.  In  virtue  of 
this  cyclic  link  it  is  the  lot  of  the  present  age  to  see  given  out  broad- 
cast, in  the  ears  of  all  men,  teachings  which  have  formed  a  part  of  the 
Mysteries  for  ages,  and  one  great  historic  presentment  of  which  was 
due  to  the  Rajput  sage  Krishna,  five  thousand  years  ago. 

Krishna  teaches  quite  clearly  the  doctrine  of  rebirth,  following 
the  lines  which  we  have  already  traced  from  the  great  Upanishads, 
and  using  the  symbolism  of  the  fires,  the  moon,  and  the  sun,  which 
we  find  everywhere  throughout  the  mystery  books.  He  also  teaches, 
with  especial  grandeur  and  force,  the  splendid  reality  of  Liberation ; 


•  23 

of  our  heritage  of  present  immortality,  our  divine  and  celestial 
destiny.  And,  speaking  of  the  cycle  of  rebirth,  he  says  that  this 
same  doctrine  was  taught  by  him  in  the  beginning  to  the  Solar  Lord 
— the  genius  of  the  great  red  race  which,  in  Egypt,  Chaldea,  and 
India,  handed  down  the  teachings  of  the  Mysteries  from  earth's 
earliest  dawn.  This  teaching,  he  says,  was  taught  by  the  Solar 
Lord  to  Manu,  and  by  Manu  to  Ikshvaku,  the  progenitor  of  the 
solar  dynasties  in  Ancient  India;  and  in  the  heart  of  this  Solar  race, 
the  race  of  the  red  Rajputs,  the  Mystery  doctrine  was  faithfully 
preserved. 

Arjuna,  also  a  Rajput,  and  the  disciple  of  Krishna,  vainly  tries  to 
comprehend  this  hard  saying,  and  answers:  "Later,  Master,  is  thy 
birth,  while  the  birth  of  the  Solar  Lord  was  earlier;  how  then  am  I 
to  understand  that  thou  hast  taught  him?  "  And  Krishna  replies: 
"  Many  are  my  past  births,  Arjuna;  and  also  thine.  But  my  past 
births  I  remember,  while  thine  thou  rememberest  not." 

This  passage  from  the  fourth  chapter  of  the  Bhagavad  Gita,  or 
Teachings  of  Krishna,  is  the  earliest  specific  and  indubitable  mention 
of  the  restored  memory  of  past  births,  in  the  Sacred  Books  of  India. 
When  we  come  to  the  next  great  revival  of  the  Mystery-teaching, 
under  Prince  Siddhartha,  of  the  Solar  line — known  to  the  religious 
world  as  Gautama  Buddha — we  shall  find  this  tradition  expanded 
and  given  out  in  its  entirety ;  so  that  we  shall  have  even  a  perfectly 
specific  and  clear  explanation  of  the  psychological  method  by  following 
which  any  man  can  remember  his  past  incarnations.  After  touching 
on  the  Buddhist  tradition  in  the  matter,  we  shall  have  to  complete 
the  theme  by  taking  the  few  though  quite  definite  allusions  in  Plato 
and  the  classical  writers,  together  with  the  one  remarkable  passage, 
"  Before  Abraham  was,  I  am,"  so  nearly  identical  with  what  the  sage 
Krishna  answered  to  Arjuna,  many  centuries  before. 

To  finish  the  subject,  as  it  refers  more  especially  to  the  main 
stream  of  occult  tradition,  we  shall  have  to  enter  on  another  mystery 
doctrine:  the  fourfold  being  of  the  soul;  for  it  is  only  by  understand- 


24 

ing  this  that  we  can  see  exactly  where  the  memories  of  the  vanished 
past  are  stored,  and  why  it  is  that,  lost  to  mortal  man,  they  are 
restored  again  to  man  the  immortal,  as  one  of  the  fruits  of  initiation. 

St.  Paul  speaks  as  an  Initiate  when  he  tells  of  the  regeneration 
from  the  psychic  to  the  spiritual  body,  and  then  speaks  of  the  spiritual 
body  as  "  the  new  man,  the  lord  from  heaven."  He  is  using  a  form 
of  speech  as  old  as  the  human  race,  and  which  only  the  tradition 
of  the  Mysteries  can  help  us  to  understand.  The  threefold  man  is 
overshadowed  by  the  highest  Spirit,  the  infinite  Eternal ;  ever  spoken 
of  in  the  tongue  of  the  Mysteries  as  the  Sun ;  therefore  it  is  that 
initiation  is  spoken  of  as  "  entering  in  by  the  door  of  the  Sun."  The 
threefold  man  thus  overshadowed  is  made  up  of  the  natural  self,  the 
psychical  self,  and  the  causal  self.  The  natural  self,  the  man  of 
animal  instinct  and  appetite,  dwells  in  the  physical  body,  the  vesture 
of  earth,  perpetually  dissolved  and  perpetually  renewed  under  nature's 
law  of  never-ending  mutation.  The  psychic  self,  the  man  of  emotions, 
of  hopes  and  fears,  of  pains  and  pleasures,  of  doubts  and  expectations, 
dwells  in  the  psychic  body,  which,  though  subject  to  time,  is  above 
the  limits  of  space,  dwelling  in  a  world  where  space  has  no  place,  as 
space  is  of  the  material  world  alone.  Above  these  two,  which  are 
subject  to  death,  is  the  causal  self,  the  immortal,  in  the  causal  vesture, 
above  both  space  and  time.  And  man  the  personality  stands  between 
the  two :  the  animal  self  below,  and  the  causal,  divine  self,  above ; 
he  is  swayed  by  the  one  or  the  other,  drawn  downwards,  or  upwards, 
according  to  the  alternations  of  his  will  and  fate. 

If  he  be  overcome  by  the  downward  tendencies,  and  allow  the 
human  soul  to  sink  altogether  into  animal  sensation,  then  the  psychic 
body  takes  on  the  likeness  of  the  physical,  and  is  formed  in  its  image. 
But  if  the  divine  bears  down  upon  man,  and  carries  him  up,  from  the 
world  of  sensation  into  the  world  of  Life  and  present  immortality, 
then  the  psychic  body  takes  on  the  image  of  the  causal  body,  and  the 
man  consciously  rises  above  death,  which  will  be  for  him  not  even  a 
break  of  consciousness,  but  simply  the  putting  aside  of  an  outer  body, 


25 

lie  being  meanwhile  conscious,  and  exercising  full  volition  in  a  psychic 
body  not  subject  to  space.  And  it  is  this  turning  or  conversion  of 
the  psychic  body,  as  vesture  of  the  human  soul,  which  St.  Paul  so 
magnificently  describes :  "  It  is  sown  in  corruption;  it  is  raised  in 
incorruption ;  it  is  sown  in  weakness,  it  is  raised  in  strength ;  it  is 
sown  a  psychic  body,  it  is  raised  a  spiritual  body." 

The  causal  and  immortal  self,  with  which  the  man  has  now  identi- 
fied his  destiny,  is  overshadowed  by  the  one  Eternal ;  the  infinite 
Ocean  of  Life;  the  Sun,  after  whose  shining  all  else  shines;  the  Soul 
of  souls.  The  causal  self  stands  in  the  midst  of  other  selves,  indi- 
vidual souls  like  it ;  and  a  part  of  its  destiny  is  to  establish  true  and 
divine  relations  between  "thyself  and  others,  myself  and  thee." 
Again,  the  causal  self  has,  as  a  part  of  its  task,  to  guide  the  lives 
which  make  up  the  chain  of  incarnations ;  it  disposes  all  things  wisely 
throughout  endless  years ;  it  is  the  divinity  which  shapes  our  ends, 
rough-hew  them  how  we  will.  Therefore  the  causal  self  is  the  lord 
of  past  and  future,  the  guardian  of  "the  whole  cycle  of  births.  And 
now  we  come  to  our  definite  answer :  the  memory  of  past  births  is 
preserved,  it  is  true ;  but  it  is  preserved  only  by  the  causal  self,  the 
immortal;  and  it  is  only  in  proportion  as  we  inherit  our  immortality, 
and  consciously  rise  above  the  barriers  of  time,  that  we  can  possibly 
inherit  the  memory  of  our  past.  While  we  are  still  confined  in  all  our 
thoughts  and  hopes  within  the  natural  self,  and  only  dimly  conscious 
even  of  our  psychic  life,  it  is  impossible  for  us  to  have  any  more 
memory  of  our  past  than  the  beasts  that  perish;  and  our  memory  of 
the  past  is  exactly  measured  by  our  foresight  for  the  future ;  if  we 
cannot  see  forward  to  our  immortality,  we  cannot  see  backwards  to 
the  dark  abysm  of  time  from  whence  we  came. 

When  we  rise  above  instinct  to  emotion,  we  already  come  under 
the  shadow  of  our  brooding  past ;  we  are  ready  to  apprehend  the 
truth  as  to  our  endless  births,  but  we  are  not  yet  ready  to  hold  any 
clear  and  definite  memories.  These  can  only  come  with  the  next 
step,  when  we  pass  above  the  limits  of  the  psychical,  and  rise  into 


the  real  realm  of  spirit  and  causal  life.  And  this  is  equivalent  to 
saying,  what  will  be  perhaps  more  readily  intelligible,  that  we  cannot 
perceive  the  memories  of  past  births  so  long  as  our  whole  minds  and 
hearts  are  preoccupied  with  the  present  birth,  the  present  day,  the 
present  hour.  Add  that  almost  all  men  living  in  the  world  bear 
about  with  them  a  heavy  burden  of  material  hopes  and  fears,  and 
that  they  are  so  wholly  wrapped  up  in  these  that  there  is  no  possi- 
bility of  their  seizing  and  steadily  apprehending  any  other  form  of 
mind-image ;  if  they  are  not  even  conscious  of  their  present  souls, 
how  can  they  be  conscious  of  the  soul's  remote  and  vanished  past  ? 
It  is  like  something  we  have  all  noted,  without  thinking  of  it:  at  a 
magic-lantern  performance  we  see  the  colored  pictures  on  the  screen, 
one  after  the  other,  images  of  lands  and  cities  and  men ;  but  if  the 
gas  be  suddenly  turned  up,  or  the  daylight  be  allowed  to  pour  in,  the 
picture  on  the  screen  instantly  becomes  invisible,  even  though  it  is 
still  there  exactly  as  before,  and  even  though  precisely  the  same  rays 
from  that  picture  are  entering  our  eyes,  just  as  they  were  while  we 
saw  the  picture.  So  the  emotions  of  each  new  birth  crowd  out  the 
memories  of  births  gone  by,  and  therefore  we  cannot  remember  trjem. 
They  are  of  a  finer  quality,  a  different  order  of  mind-images;  and 
the  coarser  and  nearer  blot  out  the  finer  and  more  remote. 

It  is,  once  more,  just  as  in  the  case  of  a  palimpsest,  where  some 
medieval  monk  or  scribe  has  taken  an  old  parchment  with  lines  of 
Homer  or  Plato,  or  some  of  the  divine  old  Greeks,  and,  erasing  the 
large  utterance  of  the  early  gods,  has  written  on  the  parchment  his 
own  thoughts  of  a  baser  and  more  common  day.  We  can  only 
recover  the  old  by  overlooking,  and  in  part  sacrificing,  the  new. 
The  first  writing  on  the  palimpsest  can  be  brought  out,  but  the  later 
writing  will  lose  its  clearness  and  sharp  outline  in  the  process. 

It  may  be  asked  of  what  profit  it  would  be  if  we  did  remember 
our  past  births,  and  what  we  lose  in  losing  them.  The  answer  is: 
to  most  men  it  would  be  no  profit  at  all ;  it  would  simply  weaken 
their  hold  on  the  present,  without  giving  them  any  hold  on  the  Eter- 


27 

nal.  For  while  still  learners  in  the  infant-school  of  the  world,  they 
can  only  grasp  the  forever  through  the  now,  and  are  therefore 
endowed  wholly  with  brief  and  ephemeral  desires.  For  them  it  would 
be  loss  rather  than  profit  to  remember  their  past ;  therefore  the  law, 
which  disposes  all  things  wisely  through  endless  years,  has  decreed 
that  they  shall  not  remember. 

But  when  the  sense  of  our  immortality  is  borne  in  upon  us,  and 
thus  gradually  loosens  the  tyranny  of  the  present,  it  is  different. 
Then  comes  the  time  for  us  to  be  reminded  that  we  have  lived  before, 
that  we  shall  live  again.  And  there  are  always  witnesses  in  the 
world  to  remind  us,  for  the  tradition  never  dies  away  utterly  from 
the  hearts  of  men. 

And  when,  under  the  leading  of  the  brooding  Soul,  we  have 
remade  ourselves  in  the  likeness  of  the  divine,  drawing  ourselves  forth 
from  time's  cycle  to  the  quiet  presence  of  eternity,  the  time  comes 
for  us  more  fully  to  remember;  to  see  the  life  of  to-day,  not  separate, 
but  taking  its  place  in  the  perfect  chain,  ranged  with  the  lives  that 
have  gone  before,  all  leading  up  to  the  everlasting;  when  man  the 
mortal  is  ready  to  be  initiated  into  present  immortality,  then  comes 
fuller  memory;  then  Krishna,  type  of  the  regenerate  soul,  replies: 
"Many  are  my  past  births,  Arjuna,  and  also  thine;  mine  I  remem- 
ber, though  thine  thou  rememberest  not.'* 


CHAPTER    III. 


Where  Memory  Dwells. 


We  compared  the  enigma  of  forgotten  births  to  a  magic  lantern 
show,  where  the  picture  can  only  be-  seen  when  all  other  lights  are 
cut  off;  we  saw  that  though  the  light  from  the  image  on  the  screen, 
carrying  every  detail  of  color  and  form,  may  even  enter  the  eyes  of 
the  spectators,  and  paint  on  their  retinas  just  the  same  picture  as 
before,  yet  they  will  see  absolutely  nothing,  nor  have  any  proof  that 
there  is  anything  to  see,  until  that  light  shines  alone,  unbroken  by 
any  other  ray. 

This  simile  carries  the  very  spirit  of  the  Eastern  sacred  books,  and 
brings  us  to  a  cardinal  point  in  all  their  teaching :  a  point  constantly 
mistaken  or  overlooked.  They  hold  this  teaching,  and  the  view 
suggested  by  this  simile,  not  only  in  regard  to  the  single  power  of 
recovered  memory,  but  for  the  whole  range  of  the  divine  powers  of 
the  soul,  for  all  of  man's  immortal  heritage.  For  the  sacred  books 
never  teach  what  they  are  often  thought  to  teach,  that  divine  and 
occult  powers  are  some  abnormal  outgrowth,  to  be  painfully  acquired 
by  the  personal  man  while  still  wearing  the  vesture,  and  still  bound 
by  the  straitened  limits,  of  his  personality ;  something  to  be  used  by 
him  as  adornments  and  conveniences  of  his  mortal  life — a  mere 
embroidery  to  his  threescore  years  and  ten. 

They  do  not  hold  that  the  high  gifts  of  magic  are  to  be  used 
chiefly  to  astonish  and  entertain  the  friends  of  the  magician,  nor  to 
help  him  to  make  a  material  success  of  his  present  life.      The  true 

28 


29 

inner  teaching  of  the  East  is  so  different  from  this,  so  much  higher 
tha"n  this,  that  its  would-be  interpreters  have  often  failed  to  grasp  it 
altogether,  and  have  fallen  into  one  grotesque  mistake  after  another, 
as  a  result  of  this  failure. 

We  must  try  to  gain  some  firm  hold  of  this  first  great  principle, 
or  all  our  further  studies  will  be  in  vain.  We  must  first  try  to  under- 
stand and  constantly  keep  in  mind  that  the  Eastern  doctrine  teaches 
that  the  soul  of  every  man  is  already  perfect,  and  perfectly  endowed 
with  all  its  infinite  powers,  being  one  with  all  other  souls  in  the 
highest  life;  so  that  no  growth  is  possible  for  the  Infinite;  nor  any 
gain  thinkable  for  that  which  is  the  limitless  all.  What  we  can  do  is, 
not  to  add  to  the  powers  of  our  souls,  but  to  come  to  some  percep- 
tion, dim  and  vague  at  the  first,  of  the  tremendous  powers  our  souls 
already  possess.  We  are  not  the  patrons  of  the  soul  and  all  its 
magical  powers,  to  develop  this,  and  call  out  that,  as  the  humor 
takes  us,  and  at  last  to  turn  the  whole  into  a  means  of  complacent 
self-glorification.  We  are  rather  humble  beneficiaries  of  the  divine 
Life;  quite  unable  to  save  our  souls, which  need  no  saving;  yet  by 
great  good  fortune  not  debarred  from  the  possibility  that  our  souls 
may  save  us. 

The  soul  of  each  of  us,  through  its  own  inherent  and  divine 
nature,  already  stands  above  the  ocean  of  birth  and  death,  above 
time  and  space,  above  pain  and  sorrow.  These  things,  and  the 
whole  material  world  which  seems  so  real  to  us,  are  not  necessary  and 
real,  but  rather  accidents  and  flaws  in  the  real  Life ;  they  are  not  the 
light,  but  rather  the  clouds  and  vapors  which  reveal  the  light,  by 
cutting  it  off,  by  breaking  its  even  flow,  by  absorbing  this  quality 
and  that,  and  thereby  showing  the  remainder  as  other  than  the  pure, 
unbroken  ray. 

With  our  low  and  material  habit  of  thought,  we  are  accustomed 
to  hold,  and  will  in  most  cases  very  confidently  assert,  that  without 
time  and  space  and  matter  there  would  be  no  real  life,  but  rather  a 
thin  abstraction,  an  unthinkable  void,  a  beatitude  little  distinguish- 


3o 

able  from  extinction.  These  thoughts,  and  the  illusions  they  deify, 
are  the  very  outer  rays  of  our  simile,  which  keep  us  from  opening 
our  eyes  to  the  revelation.  While  we  are  attuned  only  to  that 
coarser  vibration,  to  those  lower  sounds  and  grosser  colors,  we  shall 
never  catch  a  glimpse  of  the  finer  light  from  beyond  the  heavens, 
nor  any  echo  of  the  music  of  the  spheres. 

We  shall  best  understand  the  matter,  perhaps,  by  laying  theory 
aside,  and  seeing  in  what  way  we  do,  in  fact,  rid  ourselves  of  the 
bonds  of  time  and  space,  of  the  dull  burden  of  matter;  then  we 
shall  see  more  clearly  whether  that  deliverance  is  a  loss  or  a  gain ;  a 
weakening,  or  the  beginning  of  strength. 

Space  is  the  first  and  grossest  illusion ;  the  deadly  fear  of  separa- 
tion is  its  true  moral  expression,  its  real  value  in  the  science  of  life. 
It  is  the  belief  that  so  many  miles  of  land  or  sea,  so  many  dead 
yards  of  mountain  or  of  rock,  must  of  necessity  cut  off  all  intercourse 
even  between  souls  in  perfect  union  and  accord ;  so  that  out  of  sight 
is  really  out  of  mind ;  or,  even  worse,  absence  is  presence  of  regret 
and  the  sense  of  loss.  And  the  black  and  deadly  shadow  of  this 
illusion,  its  supreme  hold  on  the  heart  of  man,  is  Death ;  that  fearful 
shadow  of  final  separation,  for  which  there  is  no  hope,  no  cure,  no 
pity,  nor  any  possibility  of  warding  off  the  swiftly  approaching  and 
inexorable  doom. 

That  is  what  we  get  from  the  seeming  reality  of  space  ;  and  no 
human  heart  endowed  with  intelligence  and  feeling  will  hold  that  it 
is  a  great  and  excellent  boon.  And  now  for  what  we  gain  by  our 
first  victory  over  this  illusion :  it  is  not  that  we  are  robbed  of  space, 
shut  out  from  it,  and  barred  within  a  world  where  no  space  is,  but 
rather  that  we  come  into  possession  of  space,  into  mastery  over  it, 
so  that  our  souls  can  feel,  and  our  wills  can  act,  not  only  where 
our  bodies  are,  but  also  wherever  we  have  a  link  of  unity  and 
communion,  in  the  heart  of  a  friend.  It  is  not  mere  nearness  in 
space  that  makes  kinship.  Friendship  is  not  so  cheap  as  that.  It  is 
rather   a   direct    and    immediate    intuition    of   oneness,   a  glow  and 


3r 

enthusiasm  of  love;  the  present  sense  of  another  living  soul  felt 
directly  by  the  soul  in  us,  and  only  interpreted,  but  never  generated, 
by  the  outer  senses.  And  with  our  first  victory  over  the  illusion  of 
space  comes  the  knowledge  that  this  direct  and  intuitive  touch  of 
soul  with  soul,  of  will  with  will,  of  heart  with  heart,  this  sense  of 
another  living  being  at  one  with  us,  is  not  weakened  or  barred  by 
space,  but  is  as  strong  and  vital,  as  immediately  present  to  us, 
whether  a  mile,  a  hundred,  or  ten  thousand,  divide  heart  from  heart. 

The  truth  is  this  :  For  the  psychical  life  there  is  no  space  ;  space 
is  purely  and  solely  material.  In  the  psychic  world,  separation 
comes  through  difference  of  quality,  difference  of  vibration,  difference 
of  love,  and  not  through  difference  of  place.  Therefore  where  there 
is  union,  there  is  immediate  presence  and  contact,  even  though 
bodies  be  held  apart  by  untraveled  leagues  of  ocean.  As  soon  as 
our  imaginations  cease  to  be  filled  with  the  image  of  our  animal 
bodies,  and  are  more  rightly  occupied  with  a  sense  of  our  human 
selves,  we  begin  to  live  in  the  psychical  world,  and  thereby  we  begin 
to  conquer  space.  And  for  all  mankind,  this  beginning  has  been 
made  ages  ago,  so  that  any  simple  animal  life,  pure  as  the  animals 
live  it,  has  long  been  impossible  for  man.  But  our  psychic  being  is 
so  disordered,  so  chaotic,  so  full  of  dark  images  and  evil  imaginings, 
that  we  possess  ample  psychic  powers  without  knowing  we  possess 
them ;   and  great  misery  and  sorrow  are  our  reward. 

Animals  know  neither  the  misery  nor  the  sorrow  of  the  human 
heart ;  even  these  are  testimonies  to  our  divinity.  They  are  in  truth 
the  shadows  of  our  powers;  the  shadows  they,  in  their  august 
coming,  cast  before  them.  For  we  feel  the  misery  of  separation 
because  the  voice  in  us  says  there  should  be  no  separation ;  and  the 
discrepancy  between  intuition  and  fact  is  our  sorrow.  But  the  fact 
is  a  mere  material  shadow,  cast  into  the  psychic  world,  where  it  has 
no  true  right,  nor  proper  place;  and  only  our  corrupt  animal  life 
leads  to  our  obsession  by  these  ghosts  and  phantoms  of  the  long  past 
material  world. 


32 

The  conquest  of  animalism,  the  inheritance  of  true  human  feeling, 
brings  with  it  the  awakened  sense  of  other  human  lives,  the  splendid 
intuition  of  other  present  souls.  If  we  are  true  to  that,  setting  the 
soul  in  others  higher  than  the  animal  in  ourselves,  and  living  rather 
for  the  soul,  we  soon  have  our  reward.  Though  hills  and  valleys 
intervene,  they  do  not  intervene  between  soul  and  soul ;  nor  in  any 
degree  weaken  the  immediate,  conscious,  and  living  touch  of  one 
with  another.  We  are  rewarded  for  our  faith  by  inheriting  a  larger 
life  which  space  cannot  touch  ;  which  death  itself  no  longer  threatens. 
But  we  must  find  the  souls  of  our  friends  now,  if  we  would  hold 
them  to  us  hereafter.  We  must  never  be  content  with  a  mere 
acquaintance  with  their  bodies ;  much  less  with  those  images  of  them 
we  build  up  for  our  own  prejudices  and  desires,  making  all  men  in 
our  own  likeness.  And  this  power  to  feel  another  soul,  as  it  lives  in 
itself,  and  not  merely  as  it  ministers  to  us,  is  the  beginning  of  all 
wisdom,  the  first  step  in  all  true  illumination.  With  that  most 
excellent  gift,  we  can  in  time  learn  all  secrets.  Without  it,  the 
tongues  of  men  and  angels,  all  knowledge  and  all  mysteries  avail 
us  nothing. 

This  is  the  first  victory  over  space,  over  the  dullness  and  brute 
resistance  of  the  material  world.  It  is  the  divine  power  of  seeing 
and  feeling  souls,  by  immediate  intuition.  That  power,  like  the  rest, 
is  not  designed  merely  as  a  convenience  and  adornment  of  our  material 
life ;  it  is  rather  the  open  door  to  a  life  which  shall  in  time  wither 
up  the  last  veil  and  vestige  of  the  material  world  altogether.  We  can 
inherit  this  vision  of  soul  and  soul,  not  by  some  miraculous  unfolding 
to  be  painfully  acquired,  but  by  the  far  greater  miracle,  which  has 
been  from  the  beginning,  in  virtue  of  which  all  souls  are  forever  one. 
For  all  souls  are  but  doorways  into  the  Eternal,  and  each  doorway 
gives  entry  to  the  whole  mansion  of  the  Most  High. 

Therefore  true  soul-vision  is  to  give  us  the  realization  in  the 
beginning,  of  the  vivid  and  intimate  life  of  the  rare  souls  with  whom 
we  already  have  perfect  kinship  and  communion ;   but  in  the  end,  it 


33 

is  to  give  us  a  realization  of  the  life  of  all  other  souls  without  excep- 
tion or  abatement  in  any  regard,  whether  it  be  with  the  chiefest 
sinner  or  the  brightest  saint.  Not  all  pure  souls  only,  but  all  souls, 
whether  high  or  low,  gifted  or  groping  in  outer  darkness,  are  one 
with  the  Supreme,  and  therefore  one  with  us.  And  for  the  realization 
of  this  one  vital  truth  all  sins  and  crimes  will  be  forgiven ;  while  the 
spotless  saint  who  lacks  it  is  as  one  of  the  damned.  This  is  the 
divine  and  everlasting  law.  This  is  life's  morality,  whatever  may  be 
the  morality  of  the  sects. 

That  is  what  is  meant  by  the  victory  over  space.  It  is  a  victory 
over  the  whole  brute  world  of  darkness,  which  is  enslaved  to  space, 
and  the  entry  into  a  divine  and  miraculous  life,  where  each  soul  may 
be  infinitely  enriched  by  inheriting  the  life  of  all  other  souls  as 
enlargements  of  his  own ;  gaining  the  universal  without  losing 
individuality ;  not  exiled  from  space,  or  shut  into  some  heaven 
beyond  the  confines  of  the  wholesome  and  living  universe ;  not  over- 
coming space  in  any  way  like  that,  but  rather  overcoming  space  by 
possessing  all  of  it ;  by  gaining  the  power  to  conquer  separation,  to 
work  anywhere  in  space  where  lives  a  soul  of  man. 

This  is  the  true  victory  over  space,  as  the  Eastern  Wisdom  teaches 
it.  It  is  no  loss  nor  diminution,  but  an  infinite  gain.  And  the  victory 
over  time,  which  brings  as  one  of  its  first  fruits  the  memory  of  past 
births,  and  with  this  knowledge  of  the  past,  a  knowledge  of  the  future 
also,  is  a  victory  of  kindred  nature. 

Once  more  we  shall  set  aside  all  theories  as  to  what  time  is,  and 
whether  it  exists  in  itself  or  is  a  shadow  of  the  mind ;  we  shall  let 
theory  rest,  and  paint  rather  the  steps  by  which  the  victory  over  the 
time-spirit  is  in  fact  won.  The  means  of  the  victory  are  the  same ; 
a  slow  rising  above  the  tyranny  of  our  sensual  natures — of  that  in  us 
which  demands  unceasing  sensation,  endless  stimulus,  whether  it  be 
the  lust  of  the  flesh  or  the  lust  of  the  eyes.  The  essence  of  the  lust 
of  sensation  is  always  the  same ;  it  is  a  demand  for  fulness  of  life, 
for  the  sense  of  vivid  being,  not  through  any  inherent  energy  or 


34 
i 

activity  in  ourselves,  but  from  impressions  made  from  without ;  from 
sensations  made  on  our  nerves  by  the  material  world.  And  we 
gradually  attach  the  idea  of  one  and  another  sensation  to  this  or  that 
part  of  our  bodies,  till  our  imaginations  are  full  of  the  sense  of  palate 
or  ears  or  liver,  or  whatever  organ  we  rely  on  for  our  outward  excite- 
ment. It  is  this  clogging  of  the  imagination  with  coarse  bodily  and 
material  images  which  enchains  the  soul  within  the  body  and  hinders 
it  from  soaring  to  its  own  proper  and  divine  world ;  it  is  this  slavery 
to  bodily  images  which  makes  us  serfs  of  space,  in  which  our  bodies 
must  take  their  place  among  the  rocks  and  trees  and  all  other  things 
in  the  material  world. 

In  much  the  same  way  are  we  made  slaves  of  time.  The  lust  of 
sensation  lies  under  a  curse,  the  outcome  of  a  law  everywhere  opera- 
tive in  the  material  world.  It  is  this :  a  stimulus  of  a  certain 
character  produces  its  maximum  effect  at  the  first  impression,  and 
with  every  recurrence  loses  force.  It  therefore  follows,  with  all  the 
insistence  of  physical  law,  that  we  must  either  increase  the  stimulus, 
to  get  an  equally  strong  sensation,  or,  if  we  are  limited  to  a  certain 
measure  of  sensation,  we  must  be  prepared  to  see  the  effect  weakened 
with  every  repetition.  So  that  we  shall  have  at  last  one  of  two  things : 
cither  the  numbness  of  total  insensibility,  or  a  series  of  constantly 
strengthened  doses,  which  will  finally  shatter  the  physical  frame 
altogether.  There  is  no  third  alternative.  The  hospitals  are  full  of 
proofs  of  this  law,  which  should  be  written  in  golden  letters  over  the 
threshold  of  every  temple  of  man. 

Thus  it  befalls  that  we  come  under  the  dominion  of  time.  For 
it  is  only  a  question  of  time  when  any  given  sensation  will  either 
wear  itself  out  or  wear  us  out.  And  the  final  wearing  out  is  death. 
Half  of  mankind  go  through  the  later  years  of  their  lives  as  mere  living 
sermons  on  decrepitude ;  on  the  deadening  and  dulling  which  comes 
from  the  lust  of  sensation.  All  mankind  preach  the  final  sermon  by 
their  deaths,  a  sermon  far  more  impressive  in  its  silence  than  the 
doleful  message  of  mortuary  services,  and  the  word  of  the  sermon  is 


"O  »  n  a  tf^ 
•»  *»» 
DTNIVBRgr 

35 

this:  if  we  identify  our  thoughts,  desires  and  affections  with  the 
body  of  matter,  subject  to  dissolution,  we  too  must  die. 

Change  is  the  law  everywhere  throughout  the  material  world ;  all 
things  once  brought  together  must  again  be  separated ;  all  things 
separated  will  one  day  be  brought  together.  The  mountains  have 
been  heaved  up  from  the  ocean  depths ;  they  are  once  more  worn 
down  by  fine  water  drops  and  carried  by  the  rivers  to  pave  the  ocean 
bed.  So  it  is  with  all  matter.  Change  everywhere ;  and  time  is 
nothing  but  the  record  of  gradual  change.  Therefore  all  that  is 
subject  to  change  is  subject  to  time.  Time  is  not  a  benefit  or  reward 
we  are  shorn  of  when  we  reach  beatitude ;  it  is  a  doom,  under  which 
we  and  all  things  lie. 

And  we  conquer  time  by  turning  back  within  ourselves  from  the 
lust  of  sensation ;  from  servitude  to  material  things,  subject  to  death ; 
but  our  first  advance  inward  does  not  lift  us  altogether  above  time, 
though  it  lifts  us  above  space.  From  sensation  we  turn  to  emotion ; 
from  the  physical  we  turn  to  the  psychic  body,  and  try  to  find  our 
life  there.  And  this  is  in  truth  a  wonderful  gain,  for  with  the 
transference  of  our  imagination  to  the  psychical  body  we  triumph 
over  space,  that  is,  over  the  doom  of  separation.  Emotion  and 
thought,  feeling  and  imagination,  do  not  fill  space;  they  are  not 
subject  to  space,  nor  can  space  intercept  or  check  them.  And  when 
we  once  break  down  the  walls  of  selfishness  and  aloofness,  we  can 
touch  with  our  emotions  the  lives  and  wills  of  others,  and  in  our 
turn  become  recipient  of  theirs.  Yet  emotion  comes  under  time's 
sway.  It  is  under  a  law  as  imperious  as  that  which  dooms  sensation, 
yet  of  different  character. 

For  emotion  is  of  such  nature  that,  like  sensation,  it  soon  numbs 
the  soul,  and  the  soul  will  no  longer  feel  the  same  excitement  or 
stimulus  from  the  same  intensity  of  emotional  impression.  Its 
remedy  is  alternation.  To  one  emotion  succeeds  another,  of  opposite 
character;  to  hope,  succeeds  fear;  to  fear,  hope.  To  sorrow,  succeeds 
joy;   to  joy,  sorrow.      Such  is  the  law.     And  this  succession,  like  all 


3$ 

change,  is  a  form  of  the  time-illusion ;  it  is  in  virtue  of  time  that 
succession  is  possible.  Therefore  the  soul,  when  it  first  sought 
contrasted  emotions,  built  itself  the  garment  of  time,  to  receive  them 
in.  So  that,  even  when  we  rise  above  animalism  to  human  life,  we 
are  still  time's  slaves.     We  must  rise  yet  further,  to  be  free. 

Above  sensation  we  enter  the  life  of  emotion ;  above  emotion  we 
enter  the  life  of  the  will,  creative,  immortal,  divine.  At  last  we 
have  a  form  of  life  coming  from  within,  and  therefore  coming  under 
neither  doom.  It  is  not  dependent  on  successive  impressions  from 
without,  therefore  it  is  not  under  the  doom  of  ever  weakened  stimulus 
from  successive  sensations.  It  is  not  dependent  on  alternation,  as 
emotion  is,  therefore  it  is  not,  like  emotion,  subject  to  time.  Nor  is 
it  under  the  doom  of  continually  weakening  effect,  which  emotions 
share  with  the  grossest  forms  of  sensations,  and  which  is  also  a  part 
of  their  inheritance  in  time's  curse. 

The  creative  will  finds  its  life  not  in  reception  from  without,  but 
in  activity  from  within.  It  draws  its  energies  from  an  immortal 
source,  since  the  will  in  us  is  at  one  with  the  infinite  Life,  and  is,  in 
very  truth,  our  doorway  to  Life,  and  that  life  eternal.  In  the  will 
we  live;  in  sensation  or  emotion  we  die.  The  law  is  fixed  and 
certain.  The  Eastern  teaching  of  the  will  is  this :  there  is  for  every 
man  a  genius,  a  divine  power,  an  individual  embodiment  of  the 
infinite  Life,  which  stands  above  and  behind  his  personal  life,  and  is 
united  with  the  personal  life  by  all  his  best  and  highest  powers  and 
intuitions,  but  most  of  all  by  the  will.  The  mission  of  every  man  is 
to  embody  the  life  of  his  genius  in  himself;  to  rise  into  the  life  of 
his  genius,  and  thereby  to  become  immortal.  His  genius  will 
command  him  to  work,  and  to  work  in  three  ways.  The  first  of 
these  is  the  subjection  of  the  material  world,  through  the  will  in  him, 
as  expressed  in  his  physical  powers.  And  all  the  arts  and  sciences 
are  nothing  but  this:  the  subjection  of  Nature  to  the  will  in  us,  in 
subordination  to  an  intuition  of  power  or  an  inspiration  of  beauty. 
We   take  earthly  materials,   colored  clays,    ochres,   resins,    oils,    and 


37 

mastering  their  character  and  qualities,  we  mold  them  by  our  wills 
into  pictures  embodying  the  human  soul,  and  the  beauty  it  beholds. 
And  so  we  are  destined  to  conquer  all  nature,  and   mold  all  to  the. 
divine  uses  of  the  will. 

The  second  work  of  the  will  is  infinitely  more  difficult  than  all 
sciences  and  arts  put  together.  It  is  the  true  adjustment  by  our 
wills  of  the  balance  between  ourselves  and  all  other  selves:  the 
arrangement  of  relations  of  power  and  joy  between  all  living  souls, 
such  that,  though  all  be  different,  yet  all  shall  be  perfected  in  the 
One.  That  is  our  second  task ;  and  we  need  only  to  listen  to  the 
promptings  of  the  will,  in  every  human  relation,  to  find  the  true  and 
divine  adjustment  in  every  case.  But  in  this  task,  there  is  no  room 
for  cowards.  Much  now  deemed  of  lasting  and  universal  validity 
will  be  condemned  by  the  will ;  and  we  must  have  something  of  the 
spirit  of  revolutionaries,  if  we  would  undertake  to  make  all  things 
new.  The  fruit  of  the  first  work  of  the  will  is  a  perfect  mastery  of 
science  and  art.  The  perfect  mastery  of  the  far  greater  art  and 
science  of  human  life  is  the  second  fruit.     There  is  yet  a  third. 

After  all  has  been  said  of  Nature's  beauty,  of  the  wonderful  powers 
and  miracles  that  lie  hid  in  her  every  part,  there  remains  this  to  say : 
all  these  beauties  and  powers  are  but  weak  copies,  dim  and  vague 
reminders,  leading  us  back  from  Nature  to  the  infinite  Soul.  There 
is  where  our  heart's  hope  dwells.  And  so  with  mankind,  with  our 
other  selves.  When  the  last  word  is  spoken,  what  is  it  in  them  which 
draws  and  delights  us?  What,  in  fine,  is  it  which  makes  any  com- 
munion and  common  consciousness  at  all  possible?  It  is  the  presence 
of  the  common  soul,  in  us  as  in  them  and  all  things.  We  are  at  the 
last  driven  back  from  individuals  to  their  source,  the  one  Soul, 
wherein  all  are  one.  And  the  union  of  our  separate  selves  with  that 
immortal  and  infinite  All  is  the  last  and  highest  task  set  us  by  our 
wills.  In  the  will  is  our  peace.  This  is  the  door  of  immortality  and 
power,  not  some  dim  survival  beyond  the  grave,  in  a  vague  and 
shadowy  heaven,  but  a  present  sense  of  our  life  immortal,  here  and 


33 

now ;  something  more  certain  and  nearer  to  us  than  the  shining  of 
the  sun  or  the  beating  of  our  own  hearts. 

Therefore  the  victory  of  the  will,  the  determination  to  live  in 
will  and  work,  and  no  longer  to  live  in  emotion,  raises  us  above  both 
space  and  time ;  or,  to  speak  more  truly,  lifts  us  above  the  awful 
fear  of  separation,  the  ever-present  dread  of  death.  This  is  the 
shutting  off  of  all  outer  lights,  which  alone  makes  possible  the 
visible  shining  of  the  inner  light.  When  darkness  has  come,  when 
we  have  passed  into  the  silence  where  enter  neither  sensation  nor 
emotion,  we  shall  grow  receptive  of  the  finer  light,  and,  as  our  eyes 
grow  accustomed  to  that  truer  radiance,  we  shall  slowly  perceive  the 
measure  and  character  of  our  newly  inherited  powers. 

This  is  the  essence  of  all  the  great  religions  of  the  East,  and,  if 
this  thought  be  kept  in  mind,  it  will  be  easy  to  understand  them  all ; 
really  to  comprehend  and  grasp  the  splendid  thought  of  Liberation 
which  inspires  them  all.  This  is  the  doctrine  of  the  Mysteries,  old 
as  humanity,  old  as  life  itself;  for  this  is  the  teaching  of  the  Life. 
It  is  the  realization  by  the  will,  of  the  present  immortal  in  us ;  the 
victory  over  time  and  space  is  the  reward  carrying  with  it  an  endless 
extension  of  our  powers. 

As  we  rise  above  time,  we  first  break  away  from  the  sense  of 
uncertainty,  of  the  separation  of  our  life  into  single  days,  any  one  of 
which,  it  seems,  may  be  our  last.  For  this  separated  and  broken 
sense  of  life  we  substitute  a  sense  of  our  life  as  a  whole,  a  necessarily 
continuous  being,  whose  length  depends  not  on  a  fortunate  escape 
from  accident  and  sickness,  but  on  an  inner  necessity  and  law.  We 
grow  into  a  sense  that  our  life  is  a  whole,  a  single  unity,  not  a  mere 
collection  of  fragments ;  and  we  come  to  understand  that  the  life  of 
this  whole  is  inviolable.  This  is  the  dawn  of  immortality,  the  knowl- 
edge that  we  are  not  subject  to  the  caprice  of  Death. 

As  the  light  grows,  our  knowledge  and  power  grow  with  it.  We 
come  into  a  sense  of  our  lives  as  outside  time's  sway  altogether,  as 
subject  to  death  rather  from  a  false  association  of  thought,  from  false 


39 

imagination,  than  from  real  necessity ;  and  with  that  thought  comes 
the  sense  of  a  future  conquest  of  death,  final,  triumphant,  complete. 
We  gain  a  grasp  of  our  separate  lives  as  no  longer  separate,  but  as 
only  the  days  in  our  longer  divine  year,  with  the  nights  of  rest 
between;  and  the  long  vistas  before  us  light  up,  with  definite 
conquests  to  be  gained,  definite  tasks  to  be  performed,  definite 
powers  to  be  won. 

And  with  this  lifting  of  the  veil  from  the  future  comes  a  like 
unveiling  of  the  past.  It  draws  in,  comes  closer  to  us;  the  vast 
tracts  of  desert  oblivion  that  divided  us  from  our  dead  lives  begin  to 
shrivel  up  and  disappear,  and  the  very  remote  becomes  near  and 
familiar.  As  the  images  of  bodily  sensations  remembered  and 
desired,  the  coarse  brute  pictures  which  made  up  so  much  of  life 
begin  to  lose  their  insistence,  the  finer  images  of  our  longer  life  flash 
out  upon  us  from  the  darkness  with  sudden  brightness  and  color ; 
pictures  perfect  in  life  and  motion,  carrying  with  them  images  of 
form  and  voices  and  names,  which  fill  us  with  a  strange  sense  of  our 
own  identity  therein ;  a  knowledge  that  these  remote  and  unfamiliar 
things  have  befallen  us. 

Thus  returns  to  us  the  memory  of  past  births.  And  there  are 
to-day,  as  there  have  always  been,  many  who  remember.  One  need 
only  ask,  to  find  men  and  women  who  have  a  clear  and  definite 
vision  of  things  that  befell  them  in  other  lives.  I  have  known  many 
who  could  tell,  and  were  ready  to  tell,  the  right  inquirer.  Let  me 
give  details  of  some  of  these.  One  remembered  clearly  a  temple 
ceremony  in  a  shrine  hollowed  out  between  the  paws  of  some  great 
beast,  telling  even  the  form  of  the  landscape  and  color  of  the  sky  as 
he  had  seen  them,  when  looking  back  through  the  door.  He 
described,  without  knowing  it,  a  scene  in  ancient  Egypt,  for  the 
shrine  is  cut  out  between  the  paws  of  the  Egyptian  Sphinx — a  shrine 
of  which  he  knew  nothing,  remembering  only  the  clear  picture,  but 
having  no  sense  of  where  it  was.  He  also  had  a  quite  clear  vision 
of  a  hillside  in  India,  a  memory  belonging  to  yet  another  life;   and 


4o 

his  description  here  was  equally  vivid  and  true. 

Yet  another  spoke  of  many  lives  remembered,  one  including  a 
scene  in  a  temple  in  inner  China,  where  a  ceremony  of  the  Mysteries 
was  being  performed.  He  had  a  clear  sense  of  his  own  place  in  the 
temple,  of  the  words  spoken,  of  the  ritual  carried  out.  And  he  also 
had  definite  memory  of  two  other  births,  with  details  of  names  and 
places,  vivid  as  if  they  had  happened  yesterday. 

A  third  remembered  places  and  names,  down  to  minute  and  often 
bizarre  and  unexpected  details,  of  seven  consecutive  births.  And  all 
of  these  were  in  a  continent  other  than  that  in  which  the  present 
personality  was  born.  One  birth,  the  place  of  which  was  remembered 
with  especial  accuracy,  had  been  verified  as  to  local  color  and 
circumstance  by  the  man  himself;  another  had  fallen  in  a  land  he 
had  never  visited,  but  local  details  of  which  were  familiar  to  me. 

Let  these  three  cases  stand,  taken  at  random  from  many.  They 
show  that  it  is  with  the  memory  of  past  births  as  it  was  a  generation 
ago  with  apparitions;  it  is  impossible  to  raise  the  subject  in  a  general 
audience,  without  finding  some  one  who  remembers  something ;  and 
whoever  goes  further,  and  asks  among  the  students  of  mysticism  and 
occult  philosophy,  will  soon  meet  with  quite  definite  and  clearly 
marked  memories,  in  such  abundance  as  to  bring  the  matter  outside 
the  region  of  doubt  or  conjecture,  altogether. 

A  moment's  consideration  will  show  that  it  is  exactly  among  the 
mystics  that  we  should  seek,  though  there  are  often  startling 
exceptions  to  this  rule.  For  the  mystics  are  those  who  have  begun 
to  overcome  the  coarser  vibrations  of  life ;  to  struggle  against  the 
tyranny  of  sensation ;  to  live  from  the  will,  rather  than  from  material 
things.  And  this,  as  we  saw,  is  the  necessary  condition.  For  only 
thus  does  a  man  blend  his  consciousness  with  the  consciousness  of 
the  body  of  will,  the  causal  body,  which  is  immortal.  And,  as  we 
saw,  it  is  in  this  immortal  body,  and  here  alone,  that  the  pictures  of 
past  births  inhere. 

Therefore  to  inherit  this,  as  to  inherit  all  the  divine  powers  of  the 


4i 

Soul,  there  is  only  one  way :  to  become  one  with  the  Soul,  and  with 
its  nature ;  to  enter  into  the  pure  and  vivid  life  of  the  will ;  to  live 
from  within,  by  inherent  and  divine  energy,  and  not  from  outer 
sensations.  And  this  is  the  very  essence  and  heart  of  the  Eastern 
teaching.  "When  all  desires  that  dwell  in  the  heart  are  let  go,  the 
mortal  becomes  immortal,  and  enters  the  eternal ;  knowing  all  things, 
he  becomes  the  all."  This  from  the  Upanishads.  And  Buddhism, 
at  the  other  end  of  the  long  pedigree  of  Indian  wisdom,  teaches  the 
same  thing: 

"  If  a  disciple,  or  disciples,  should  frame  this  wish:  '  Let  me  call 
to  mind  many  previous  states  of  existence,  to  wit,  one  birth,  two 
births,  three  births,  four  births,  five  births,  ten  births,  twenty  births, 
thirty  births,  forty  births,  fifty  births,  one  hundred  births,  one 
thousand  births,  one  hundred  thousand  births,  many  destructions  of 
a  world-cycle,  many  renovations  of  a  world-cycle,  many  destructions 
and  many  renovations  of  a  world-cycle,  so  as  to  say :  I  lived  in  such 
a  place,  had  such  a  name,  was  of  such  a  family,  of  such  a  class,  had 
such  maintenance,  experienced  such  happiness  and  such  miseries,  had 
such  a  length  of  life.  Then  I  passed  from  that  existence  and  was 
reborn  in  such  a  place.  There  also  I  had  such  a  name,  was  of  such 
a  family,  of  such  a  class,  had  such  maintenance,  experienced  such 
happiness  and  such  miseries,  had  such  a  length  of  life.  Then  I 
passed  from  that  existence  and  was  reborn  in  this  existence ' — thus 
let  me  call  to  mind  many  former  states  of  existence,  and  let  me 
specifically  characterize  them,  '  then  must  he  be  perfect  in  the 
precepts,  bring  his  thoughts  to  a  state  of  quietness,  practice  diligently 
the  trances,  attain  to  insight,  and  be  much  alone.'  " 

Between  the  extreme  brevity  of  the  Upanisha*d  and  the  absolute 
completeness  of  detail  in  the  Buddhist  Sutra  the  whole  Eastern 
doctrine  is  given  here.  But  to  appreciate  fully  the  moral  and 
spiritual  meaning  of  the  last  sentences  we  should  have  to  go  deeper 
into  Buddhism,  and  there  we  should  find  that  the  requirements  set 
down  here  cover  the  very  thing  we  have  spoken  of :   the  raising  of  the 


42 

mind  above  sensuality,  which  imprisons  the  imagination  in  the  animal 
body,  and  above  selfishness,  which  imprisons  feeling  in  the  personal 
self ;  for  both  these  limitations  are  barriers  to  real  life,  and  only  with 
our  entrance  into  real  life  can  we  begin  to  inherit  the  powers  of  our 
divinity — and  among  them  the  memory  of  former  births,  which 
belongs  not  to  the  mortal,  but  to  the  immortal  man. 


CHAPTER    IV. 


How  to  Remember. 

The  oldest  of  occult  teachings  of  India  are  the  Upanishads :  the 
Books  of  Hidden  Wisdom.  After  them,  according  to  the  venerable 
tradition  of  the  East,  comes  the  great  development  of  the  Secret 
Teaching  which  culminated  in  the  revelation  of  Krishna,  and  which 
finds  its  greatest  monument  in  that  most  mystical  of  scriptures,  the 
Bhagavad  Gita,  the  Songs  of  the  Master.  Halfway  between  Krishna 
and  the  present  day  comes  the  great  Rajput  prince  whom  the 
religious  world  of  the  East  knows  as  the  Buddha,  of  the  clan  of  the 
Gotamas,  and  of  the  Shakya  race. 

These  three  great  unfoldings  of  the  Wisdom  Religion  correspond 
to  three  stages  of  the  teaching  of  rebirth,  and  therefore  of  the 
memory  of  past  births.  The  great  Upanishads,  occupied  before  all 
else  with  establishing  the  present  intuition  of  the  Soul,  the  Power 
which  wells  up  in  the  individual  being  of  all  men,  and  into  whose 
bosom  all  men  must  return,  speak  little  of  rebirth,  laying  down 
merely  the  outline  of  the  teaching  and  never  lingering  over  the 
details.  The  law  of  continuous  moral  energy,  in  virtue  of  which 
rebirth  is  a  necessity,  the  three  modes  of  rebirth,  according  to  the 
preponderance  of  the  material,  the  psychic,  or  the  spiritual  nature  in 
the  man  to  be  reborn,  and  the  teaching  of  rest  in  paradise  between 
birth  and  birth,  are  all  clearly  set  forth ;  after  that,  the  particular 
application  is  left  to  the  disciple  himself,  as  a  necessary  exercise  for 
his  opening  spiritual  faculties.  In  harmony  with  the  same  principle 
the  Upanishads  do  not  lay  stress  on  the  memory  of  past  births ;  they 
teach  the   necessity  of  this  memory  more  as  a  part  of   a   general 

43 


44 

illumination  than  as  a  particular  end  to  be  held  in  view ;  we  have 
to  infer  their  views,  rather  than  to  find  them  ready  made.  The 
Upanishads  teach  that  when  all  desires  that  dwell  in  the  heart  are  let 
go,  the  mortal  becomes  immortal,  and  enters  the  Eternal ;  that  the 
Eternal,  with  whom  the  mortal  is  now  at  one,  is  lord  of  what  has 
been  and  what  shall  be ;  master  of  past  and  future  alike.  From  this 
it  follows  as  a  necessary  deduction,  but  only  as  a  deduction,  that  the 
man  who  reaches  adeptship,  in  this  union  with  the  Eternal,  must  of 
necessity  regain  a  knowledge  of  his  past  births,  as  this  is  a  part  of 
that  omniscience  to  which  he  is  now  heir.  But  nearer  than  that  the 
great  Upanishads  do  not  go. 

The  Bhagavad  Gita,  representing  the  work  of  a  later  age,  though 
an  age  which  is  still  five  millenniums  distant  from  us,  if  we  are  to 
accept  the  tradition  of  the  East  itself,  is  much  more  detailed  and 
definite ;  at  the  same  time  it  loses  much  of  that  grand  and  universal 
sweep,  that  magnificent  width  and  power,  which  distinguish  the 
Upanishads  from  all  other  books.  The  Bhagavad  Gita  speaks  far 
more  explicitly  of  former  births:  Many  are  my  past  births,  Arjuna, 
and  also  thine.      Mine  I  remember;   thine  thou  rememberest  not. 

There  is  no  such  explicit  statement  as  that  in  the  great 
Upanishads ;  but  even  in  the  Bhagavad  Gita  the  memory  of  past 
births,  and,  what  concerns  us  most  directly  now,  the  teaching  how  to 
remember,  are  rather  held  in  the  background,  kept  subordinate  to 
the  much  greater  theme :   how  we  are  to  reach  liberation. 

It  is  only  when  we  come  to  Buddhism  that  we  meet  with  full 
detail ;  with  such  a  richness  and  profusion  of  definite  statement, 
indeed,  as  rather  overwhelms  than  illumines  us.  For  an  overrichness 
and  luxuriance  of  imagery,  illustration,  comment,  analysis,  are  every- 
where through  Buddhism,  the  result  of  the  tremendous  moral  and 
intellectual  stimulus  impressed  on  the  minds  of  his  age  by  the  Rajput 
prince  of  Kapilavastu.  In  the  Buddhist  books,  the  doctrine  of 
rebirth  is  the  main  motive  of  a  whole  class  of  teachings :  parables 
which    point    their  morals,  not  by  some   imaginary  history  like   the 


45 

good  Samaritan  or  the  unjust  judge,  but  by  incidents  avowedly  taken 
from  former  lives  of  the  Buddha  himself,  and  in  which  the  subordinate 
parts  are  assigned  to  the  hearers  present,  their  moral,  social  and 
physical  characters  in  their  present  births  being  explained  by  their 
actions  and  aspirations,  good  or  evil  deeds,  in  lives  gone  by. 

This  form  of  birth  story,  which,  we  cannot  doubt,  was  in  the  first 
instance  really  used  by  the  Buddha  to  illustrate  the  laws  of  life,  and 
especially  of  continuity  of  moral  force  through  birth  after  birth, 
became  such  a  favorite  with  his  followers  that  in  time  they  found  it 
difficult  to  tell  a  story  otherwise  than  as  an  episode  from  a  former 
birth;  all  their  fables  of  animals  are  molded  in  this  form,  and 
relate  that,  in  such  an  age,  under  such  a  king,  the  Master  was  a 
hare  or  a  tiger,  or  a  crane,  and  that,  in  his  animal  embodiment,  such 
and  such  incidents  befell.  Their  romances  even  take  the  same  form ; 
for  instance,  the  tale  of  Temiya  in  Burmese,  or  of  the  lady  Visakha 
in  Pali,  both  of  which  turn  on  destiny  as  molded  by  our  own  former 
acts,  and  both  of  which  go  into  the  amplest  detail,  leaving  nothing 
at  all  to  the  imagination,  but  supplying  the  equations  of  moral  action 
with  more  than  mathematical  precision. 

This  luxuriance,  this  rank  abundance  even,  is  only  the  outward 
and  visible  sign  of  the  perfectly  definite  teaching  as  to  rebirth  which 
the  Buddha  did  undoubtedly  hand  down  to  his  disciples ;  and,  though 
we  cannot  trace  the  fullest  directions  for  the  recovery  of  lost 
memories  to  the  Buddha  himself,  yet  there  are  passages  among  his 
teachings,  among  the  teachings  attributed  to  him  personally,  that  is, 
which  make  it  absolutely  certain  that  he  did  give  his  disciples  quite 
definite  rules  for  the  acquirement  of  this  marvelous  power.  Let  me 
quote  one  such  passage  previously  given  in  this  series : 

"If,  devotees,  a  devotee  should  desire  thus:  'Let  me  call  to 
mind  many  previous  states  of  existence,  as,  one  birth,  two  births, 
three  births,  four  births,  five  births,  ten  births,  twenty  births,  thirty 
births,  forty  births,  fifty  births,  one  hundred  births,  one  thousand 
births,  one  hundred  thousand  births,  many  destructions  of  a  world- 


46 

cycle,  many  renovations  of  a  wo  rid -cycle,  many  destructions  and 
renovations  of  a  world-cycle,  saying:  I  lived  in  such  a  place,  had 
such  a  name,  was  of  such  a  family,  of  such  a  caste,  had  such 
possessions,  such  joys  and  sorrows,  and  such  a  length  of  life.  Then 
I  passed  from  that  existence,  and  was  reborn  in  such  a  place.  There 
also  I  had  such  a  name,  was  of  such  a  family,  of  such  a  caste,  had 
such  possessions,  experienced  such  joys  and  sorrows,  and  such  a 
length  of  life.  Then  I  passed  from  that  existence  and  was  reborn  in 
this  existence.  Thus  let  me  call  to  mind  many  former  states  of 
existence,  and  let  me  precisely  define  them ' — if  he  should  so  desire, 
he  must  be  perfect  in  the  precepts,  bring  his  emotions  to  a  state  of 
quiescence,  practice  the  trances  diligently,  attain  to  illumination,  and 
dwell  in  solitude." 

Let  me  begin  by  saying  that  one  such  passage  as  this,  and  there 
are  hundreds  of  them,  settles  once  and  for  all  the  controversy  whether 
the  Buddha  taught  the  persistence  of  individuality  through  the  line 
of  rebirths,  and  settles  it  in  the  affirmative.  M  In  such  a  birth,  I  was 
such  a  one,"  implies  the  identity  of  ego  from  first  to  last.  Next,  we 
must  note  that  this  teaching  is  offered  only  to  certain  people,  and 
not  to  all  indiscriminately :  to  the  devotees,  namely,  those  who  have 
taken  their  refuge  in  the  Buddha,  in  the  Law,  and  in  the  Communion ; 
who,  like  their  lord,  have  renounced  the  pomps  and  vanities  of  this 
wicked  world,  and  all  the  sinful  lusts  of  the  flesh.  This  limitation  is 
exactly  equivalent  to  what  we  saw  before :  that  the  memory  of  past 
births  can  only  come  after  a  weakening  of  the  tyranny  of  the  actual, 
of  the  present  birth;  just  as  the  magic-lantern  picture  can  only 
become  visible  by  shutting  out  the  daylight,  or  turning  down  all  other 
lights.  We  must  lose  our  view  of  our  immediate  surroundings  if  we 
are  to  catch  the  views  of  other  scenes  and  other  climes,  mountains, 
cities  and  seas,  which  the  magic-lantern  can  paint  upon  the  screen. 
Therefore  we  shall  find  Buddhism  always  offering  these  directions 
to  disciples  only;  to  those  who  have  overcome  the  tyranny  of  th£ 
world ;   for  these  alone  could  profit  by  the  teaching. 


47 

We  may  then  note  that  the  things  touched  on  as  remembered 
first,  pictures  of  places  and  names,  are  just  the  things  which,  in  point 
of  fact,  people  do  remember  first,  as  in  the  cases  of  several  people 
personally  known  to  me,  who  have  recovered  fragments,  or  even 
large  portions  of  their  heritage  of  memory  of  the  past.  And  finally 
we  are  to  remember  that  the  directions  specifically  laid  down,  such 
as  practicing  the  precepts,  attaining  illumination,  entering  the  trances, 
point  in  the  direction  in  which  it  is  inevitable  they  should  point : 
namely,  the  conscious  existence  of  the  immortal  self,  in  that  causal 
body  from  which  all  rebirths  come  forth. 

We  could  further  bring  out  the  points  in  this  passage,  and 
illustrate  the  precise  moral  and  mental  actions  which  it  prescribes 
to  the  end  of  remembering  the  past,  by  showing  at  length  what  are 
the  precepts  to  be  practiced,  what  is  meant  by  entering  the  trances 
and  attaining  to  illumination.  For  each  of  these  we  have  abundant 
material ;  but  it  seems  better  to  turn  at  once  to  another  passage  of 
the  Buddhist  scriptures,  where  the  directions  for  remembering  past 
births  are  given  with  a  precision  and  definiteness  which  simply  leave 
nothing  more  to  be  imagined  or  desired. 

This  passage  is  from  the  Vishuddhi  Marga,  or  Path  of  Purity, 
a  great  work  written  some  sixteen  hundred  years  ago  by  the  famous 
sage,  Buddhaghosha,  whose  name  signifies  the  Voice  of  the  Buddha, 
the  revealer  of  the  Buddha's  teachings.  Our  passage  is  part  of  a 
commentary  on  a  sermon  of  the  Buddha,  a  passage  very  like  that 
which  we  have  just  quoted ;  and  it  is  intended  to  give  more  ample 
and  detailed  instruction  as  to  the  meaning  of  the  very  points  we  have 
touched  on :  the  precise  moral  and  mental  acts  to  be  carried  out  by 
those  who  would  remember.  It  is  rather  lengthy  to  quote  in  full, 
but  I  shall  try  to  leave  out  nothing  essential  to  a  sound  understanding 
of  the  method  laid  down  : 

' '  There  are  six  classes  of  people  who  can  call  to  mind  former 
states  of  existence :  devotees  of  other  sects,  ordinary  disciples,  great 
disciples,  chief  disciples,  separate  Buddhas,  and  Buddhas. 


48 

"The  power  possessed  by  devotees  of  other  sects  to  perceive 
former  states  of  existence  is  like  the  lamp  of  the  glow-worm ;  that  of 
the  ordinary  disciple  is  like  the  light  of  a  small  lamp ;  that  of  the 
great  disciples  is  like  the  light  of  a  torch ;  that  of  the  chief  disciples 
is  like  the  light  of  the  morning-star ;  that  of  the  separate  Buddhas  is 
like  the  light  of  the  moon ;  that  of  the  Buddhas  is  like  the  thousand- 
rayed  disk  of  the  summer  sun.  Our  present  text  concerns  itself  only 
with  disciples  and  their  power  to  call  to  mind  former  states  of  existence. 

"The  devotee,  then,  who  tries  for  the  first  time  to  call  to  mind 
former  states  of  existence,  should  choose  a  time  after  breakfast,  when 
he  has  returned  from  collecting  alms,  and  is  alone  and  plunged  in 
meditation,  and  has  been  absorbed  in  the  four  trances  in  succession. 
On  rising  from  the  fourth  trance,  which  leads  to  the  higher  powers,  he 
should  consider  the  event  which  last  took  place,  namely,  his  sitting 
down;  next  the  spreading  of  the  mat ;  the  entering  of  the  room  ;  the 
,putting  away  of  bowl  and  robe ;  his  eating ;  his  leaving  the  village ; 
his  going  the  rounds  of  the  village  for  alms ;  his  entering  the  village 
for  alms;  his  departure  from  the  monastery;  his  offering  adoration 
in  the  courts  of  the  shrine  and  of  the  Bodhi  tree ;  his  washing  the 
bowl ;  what  he  did  between  taking  the  bowl  and  rinsing  his  mouth ; 
what  he  did  at  dawn ;  what  he  did  in  the  middle  watch  of  the  night ; 
what  he  did  in  the  first  watch  of  the  night.  Thus  he  must  consider 
all  that  he  did  for  a  whole  day  and  night,  going  backwards  over  it  in 
reverse  order. 

"As  much  as  this  is  plain  even  to  the  ordinary  mind,  but  it  is 
exceedingly  plain  to  one  whose  mind  is  in  preliminary  concentration. 
But  if  there  is  any  one  event  which  is  not  plain,  then  he  should  once 
more  enter  upon  the  trance  which  leads  to  the  higher  powers,  and 
when  he  has  risen  from  it,  he  must  again  consider  that  past  event ; 
this  will  suffice  to  make  it  as  plain  as  if  he  had  used  a  lighted  lamp. 

"  In  the  same  reverse  order  he  must  consider  what  he  did  the 
day  before,  the  day  before  that,  up  to  the  fifth  day,  the  tenth  day,  a 
fortnight  ago,  a  month  ago,   a  year  ago ;   and  having  in  the  same 


49 

manner  considered  the  previous  ten  and  twenty  years,  and  so  on  up 
to  the  time  of  his  conception  in  this  birth,  he  must  then  consider  the 
name  and  form  which  he  had  at  the  moment  of  death  in  his  last  birth. 
A  skilled  devotee  is  able  at  the  first  attempt  to  penetrate  beyond 
conception,  and  to  take  as  his  object  of  thought  the  name  and  form 
which  he  had  at  the  moment  of  death  in  his  last  birth.  But  since  the 
name  and  form  of  the  last  birth  came  quite  to  an  end,  and  were 
replaced  by  others,  this  point  of  time  is  like  thick  darkness,  and 
difficult  to  be  made  out  by  the  mind  of  any  person  still  deluded.  But 
even  such  a  one  should  not  despair,  nor  say :  '  I  shall  never  be  able 
to  penetrate  beyond  conception,  or  to  take  as  the  object  of  my 
thought  the  name  and  form  which  I  had  in  my  last  birth,  at  the  moment 
of  death,1  but  he  should  again  and  again  enter  the  trance  which  leads 
to  the  higher  powers,  and  each  time  he  rises  from  the  trance,  he 
should  again  intend  his  mind  upon  that  point  of  time. 

"Just  as  a  strong  man  in  cutting  down  a  mighty  tree  to  be  used 
as  the  peaked  roof  of  a  pagoda,  if  the  edge  of  his  axe  be  turned  in 
lopping  off  the  branches  and  twigs,  will  not  despair  of  cutting  down 
the  tree,  but  will  go  to  an  iron-worker's  shop,  have  his  axe  sharpened, 
return,  and  go  on  with  his  cutting;  and  if  the  edge  of  his  axe  be 
turned  a  second  time,  he  will  a  second  time  have  it  sharpened,  and 
return,  and  go  on  with  his  cutting;  and  since  nothing  that  he  has 
chopped  once  needs  to  be  chopped  again,  he  will  in  no  long  time> 
when  there  is  nothing  left  to  chop,  fell  that  mighty  tree.  In  the 
same  way  the  devotee  rising  from  the  trance  that  leads  to  the  higher 
powers,  without  considering  what  he  has  already  considered  once,  and 
considering  only  the  moment  of  conception,  in  no  long  time  will 
penetrate  beyond  the  moment  of  conception,  and  take  as  his  object 
the  name  and  form  which  he  had  at  the  moment  of  death,  in  his  last 
birth. 

"  His  alert  attention  having  become  possessed  of  this  knowledge, 
he  can  call  to  mind  many  former  states  of  existence,  as,  one  birth, 
two  births,  three  births,  four  births,  five  births,  and  so  on,  in  the 
words  of  the  text."     •> 


5o 

So  far,  the  teaching.  It  will  be  seen  to  depend  wholly  on  what 
we  are  accustomed  to  call  the  association  of  ideas:  the  principle,  in 
virtue  of  which,  when  two  ideas  are  received  in  connection  with  each 
other,  the  evocation  of  one  tends  to  call  up  the  other  also.  Thus 
the  starting-point  is  in  every  case  the  present  moment,  and  the 
disciple  is  to  consider  this  moment,  in  order  to  evoke  the  impression 
which  directly  preceded  it ;  this  new  mind-image  is  next  to  be  held  in 
view,  in  order  that  the  mental  picture  joined  on  to  it  at  the  other  end, 
so  to  speak,  should  next  be  brought  into  the  centre  of  the  mind's  field 
of  view.  This  process  is  to  be  repeated  until  the  whole  colored 
ribbon  printed  with  the  events  of  the  past  four-and-twenty  hours  has 
been  drawn  back  again  before  the  mind's  eye.  But  the  ribbon  is  not 
separated  nor  broken  off  at  this  point ;  it  is  joined  to  a  like  ribbon  of 
yesterday ;  to  reach  the  end  of  one  is  to  find  the  beginning  of  another. 

Now  we  are  ready  to  come  to  another  aspect  of  the  matter.  During 
the  last  few  years,  evidence  has  been  accumulating  on  all  hands  to 
show  that  we  never  really  forget  anything.  We  have  rediscovered 
the  memory  of  the  subconscious  mind.  One  way  in  which  this  mani- 
fests itself  is  in  the  mesmeric  or  somnambulistic  sleep,  where  pictures 
and  images  hopelessly  beyond  recall  for  the  habitual  mind  come  to  the 
surface  in  fragments  or  whole  series,  as  the  case  may  be.  The  classical 
story  is  that  of  the  servant-maid  who,  falling  into  a  trance,  repeated 
.long  passages  of  Hebrew  and  Greek  and  Latin.  Careful  investigation 
for  a  long  time  failed  to  suggest  any  explanation,  until  it  was  discovered 
that  she  had  years  before  been  attendant  on  a  learned  divine,  who 
was  in  the  habit  of  reading  aloud  in  these  dead  tongues;  the  girl, 
quite  unconsciously,  had  absorbed  long  trains  of  sounds  quite  meaning- 
less to  her,  and  these  were  stored  up  faithfully  and  indelibly  in  her 
subjective  memory,  till  the  hour  of  trance  came,  when  her  secret 
treasure-house  was  unlocked. 

Now  comes  the  application.  The  Buddhists  of  twenty-five 
hundred  years  ago,  like  the  Indian  occultists  forages  before  that,  were 
perfectly  familiar  with  all  that  w^  know  of  the  subjective  mind,  and 


5i 

with  much  that  we  have  not  yet  guessed.  They  had  discovered  all 
that  is  implied  in  this  story  of  the  servant-maid  who  talked  Greek  and 
Hebrew,  and,  more  than  that,  they  had  found  the  key  to  the  hidden 
cabinet,  and  could  open  it  at  will.  They  knew  the  secret  of  "the 
trances  leading  to  the  higher  powers,"  and  could  acquire  the  power 
of  entering  them  at  will ;  their  monasteries  were  nothing  but  great 
colleges  of  practical  psychology,  where  this  and  much  more  was  taught ; 
but  there  was  one  indispensable  condition  precedent  to  entering  these 
colleges  of  occultism ;  perfect  disinterestedness  and  charity,  typified  by 
an  act  of  renunciation  after  which  the  devotee  bound  himself  to  touch 
no  money,  to  live  on  alms  only,  on  food  freely  offered  by  those  who 
had  faith  in  his  work. 

This  charity  and  disinterestedness,  this  detachment  from  the 
fortunes  of  the  present  personality,  alone  furnishes  the  condition  of 
mind  and  soul  in  which  the  trances  can  be  entered  at  will ;  the  same 
mood  must  be  present  in  some  degree  for  the  trances  to  be  entered 
at  all.  There  must  be  a  renunciation,  if  only  for  a  time.  There 
must  be  a  letting  go,  a  loosening  of  that  greed  and  graspingness 
which  thoroughly  dominate  the  ordinary  man  and  the  ordinary  life. 
It  is  the  old  story  of  the  magic-lantern ;  the  lights  must  be  turned  out 
first.  Therefore  the  devotee  or  disciple  spoken  of  in  the  Buddhist 
texts  is  one  who  has  this  disinterestedness,  who  can  rise  above  the 
graspingness  of  his  present  personality,  and  who  can,  therefore,  find 
the  doorway  to  his  subjective  mind,  his  subconscious  memory.  The 
very  words  of  the  text  prove  that  this,  and  nothing  else,  is  meant ; 
for,  if  the  devotee  break  down  in  his  reversed  chain  of  memory,  what 
is  he  directed  to  do  ?  To  enter  the  trance  again ;  that  is,  to  withdraw 
once  more  from  the  disturbing  sense  of  his  outward  surroundings,  in 
order  that  the  memories  of  his  subjective  mind,  of  quite  different 
texture,  as  they  are,  may  be  able  to  print  themselves  on  his  mental 
vision. 

Once  more,  this  association  of  memories,  with  the  power  of 
catching  the  links  of  association  so  as  to  pull  the  colored  ribbons 


52 

back  through  the  mind,  is  a  faculty  which  improves  enormously  by 
practice.  The  greatest  modern  teacher  of  Mnemonics  bases  his  whole 
system  on  this  one  thing:  the  constant  exercise  of  the  memory  on 
chains  of  naturally  associated  words  and  sounds,  and  those  who 
apply  his  system  find  that  their  memories  are  thereby  so  strengthened 
that  they  can  apply  the  added  power  in  any  direction,  not  merely  in 
the  direction  in  which  it  has  first  been  exercised. 

What  happens  is  this :  the  mind's  eye  is  trained  to  focus  itself 
correctly  on  the  mind-pictures,  which  are  as  real  as  stones  and  trees, 
but  of  a  different  order  of  reality ;  and  the  power  once  gained,  the 
mind's  eye  can  come  to  focus  on  different  links  of  association ;  and 
can  thus  clearly  see  the  picture  next  to  any  picture  already  before 
its  vision.  Once  the  mind's  eye  is  trained  to  focus  correctly  on  these 
finer  images,  it  is  only  a  matter  of  diligence  to  draw  back  before  its 
vision  the  pictures  of  a  year  ago,  or  of  two,  five  or  ten  years  ago. 
The  condition  for  success  is,  that  the  mental  eye  shall  not  be  put  out 
of  focus  by  intending  itself  upon  the  coarser  images  of  material  and 
selfish  desires ;  that  is,  desires  concerned  only  with  the  animal  body. 
For  however  good  these  may  be  in  their  own  place,  they  are 
unquestionably  of  a  quite  different  quality  from  the  mind-pictures  we 
are  dealing  with,  and  the  mind  cannot  be  focussed  for  both  at  once. 

It  is  just  the  same  in  optics.  If  you  wish  to  use  a  telescope  for 
the  study  of  the  stars,  you  must  use  a  particular  eyepiece  and  a 
definite  focus ;  if  you  wish  to  look  at  your  neighbor's  cabbage-garden 
you  must  change  eyepiece  and  focus.  It  is  no  disparagement  of 
cabbages  to  say  they  are  not  stars ;  but  the  fact  remains,  that  the 
nature  of  the  cabbage  is  one  thing,  while  the  nature  of  the  star  is 
another.  So  with  mind-images;  they  are  of  different  orders,  and 
the  mind  cannot  be  focussed  for  both  at  once.  Therefore  we  see 
that,  so  far  as  the  present  birth  is  concerned,  there  is  nothing  in  the 
Buddhist  scripture  which  we  cannot  understand  and  believe;  and, 
what  is  more,  there  is  nothing  in  it  which  we  cannot  verify. 

Now  to  come  to  the  much  larger  question :   the  memory  of   past 


53 

births.  The  mind-chains  of  the  present  birth  are,  as  we  saw, 
complete ;  but  not  in  the  physical  mind  of  the  outward  personality. 
They  are  complete  in  the  subjective  mind  of  the  psychical  self,  the 
door  to  which  is  opened  in  trance,  whether  involuntary,  as  in  the 
case  of  the  servant-maid,  or  intentionally  and  consciously  entered,  as 
in  that  of  the  Buddhist  devotee.  The  psychical  mind-pictures, 
forming  an  unbroken  ribbon,  are  all  perfectly  visible  to  the  psychical 
self ;  but  they  can  only  leak  into  the  consciousness  of  the  physical 
self  in  broken  fragments,  in  such  rags  and  shreds  of  memory  as  you 
have,  say  of  a  given  month  ten  years  ago.  Yet  the  mesmerist  could 
unlock  from  your  mind  an  unbroken  picture  of  that  month,  or  of  any 
month,  up  to  the  moment  your  personal  consciousness  began  in  the 
present  birth. 

Just  as  the  ribbon  of  mind-pictures  is  complete  in  the  subjective 
mind  of  the  psychical  self,  so  that  all  the  episodes  of  a  lifetime  are  there 
indelibly  recorded,  so  the  episodes  of  that  larger  life,  in  which  birth  and 
death  are  but  as  day  and  night,  are  recorded  indelibly  in  that  deeper 
and  more  subjective  memory  which  belongs  to  the  causal  and 
immortal  self,  who  stands  behind  physical  and  psychic  alike.  And 
these  memories  can  only  be  reached  in  one  way :  by  rising  up  above 
the  psychical  and  animal  instincts  which  limit  us  to  the  material  self ; 
and  then  by  ascending  higher,  above  all  the  personal  and  individual 
limitations  which  tie  us  to  the  psychic  self;  by  doing  this. habitually, 
the  vision  of  the  causal  self  will  be  so  trained  and  strengthened  that  it 
will  be  able  easily  to  overleap  the  chasm  of  death,  and  to  take  up  the 
memories  which  lie  beyond  the  tomb. 

It  is  not  my  intention  to  go  deeper  into  this  question  here ;  but 
enough  has  been  said  to  make  it  clear  that  the  devotee,  the  Eastern 
occultist,  who  dwells  retired  from  the  world,  in  stillness  and  alone,  may 
yet  be  exercising  faculties  of  tremendous  importance  and  power,  not 
only  to  his  own  signal  benefit,  but  also  to  the  benefit  of  the  whole 
human  race.  To  the  study  and  disinterested  work  of  these  Eastern 
sages  is  due  the  fact  that  the  real  science  of  the  soul  is  still  within  the 


54 

possession  of  mankind ;  our  material  races  would  have  lost  it  utterly. 
If  it  be  asked  what  these  sages  have  given  us  out  of  their  treasure,  let 
me  answer:  they  have  given  us,  among  other  things,  this  very 
doctrine  of  reincarnation,  which  alone  makes  intelligible  the  darkest 
riddles  of  human  life ;  which  alone  gives  us  present  knowledge  of  our 
immortality. 

I  have  outlined  the  manner  in  which,  as  a  matter  of  fact,  this 
doctrine  did  come  to  our  day  and  generation.  It  came,  for  us,  through 
the  message  of  a  woman,  much  maligned  and  traduced  in  her  life,  but 
who,  nevertheless,  put  her  testimony  on  record.  Where  did  she  get 
it?  She  herself  persistently  made  answer:  from  the  Eastern  sages, 
who  spoke  what  they  did  know,  and  testified  to  the  things  their  own 
eyes  had  witnessed ;  to  those  who,  treading  in  the  path  of  the  occultists 
of  old,  of  the  sages  of  the  Upanishads,  and  the  latter  Buddhist 
devotees,  had  actually  recovered  the  memory  of  their  former  births, 
and  could  tell  of  that  past  which  we  call  forgotten,  but  which,  for 
them,  was  very  well  remembered.  It  is  only  in  the  present  day  that 
our  races  of  the  West  have  so  far  given  up  their  faith  in  fire  and 
brimstone,  as  the  one  satisfactory  answer  to  life's  riddle,  have  so  far 
surrendered  the  crude  and  crass  materialism  which  followed  after  that, 
as  to  be  ready  once  more  to  hear  the  world-old  teaching.  And  the 
moment  the  world  was  ready,  the  doctrine  was  once  more  publicly 
taught.  For  so  our  needs  are  provided  for,  and  humanity  is  safe- 
guarded far  better  than  mankind  guesses,  or  could  understand. 

Nor  in  truth  has  the  tradition  of  past  births,  and  of  our  grander 
memories  which  embrace  them,  been  quite  hidden  from  any  race  at 
any  time.  It  is  spoken  of  in  that  episode  of  Virgil's  epic  which,  on 
the  testimony  of  all  antiquity,  presents  dramatically  the  themes  of 
the  Greater  Mysteries.  It  has  echoes  in  Plato,  who  speaks  of  the 
waters  of  that  mystical  Lethe  which  washed  from  men's  minds  the 
memories  of  bygone  sorrows,  so  that  they  might  once  more  have 
the  courage  to  take  up  the  heavy  burden  of  life;  but  some  there  be 
who,  in  Plato's  teaching,  drink  less  deep  of  Lethe,  and  so  remember. 


55 

Among  the  Jews  this  doctrine  of  rebirth  was  held  as  a  mystery- 
teaching  of  the  Kabbalists,  who  taught  that  the  same  pure  spirit  was 
embodied  in  Adam  and  David,  and  should  return  again  in  the 
Messiah,  who  was  therefore,  in  a  mystical  sense,  the  son  of  David, 
and  the  second  Adam.  They  held  also  that  the  soul  of  Japhet,  son 
of  Noah,  was  the  same  as  that  of  Simeon;  that  Terah  was  reborn 
as  Job. 

Among  the  older  races,  in  the  temples  of  Chaldea  and  Egypt, 
and  most  of  all  in  India,  the  same  teaching  held ;  and,  coming  to 
European  lands,  we  find  it  in  the  schools  of  the  Druids.  No  other 
doctrine  has  ever  been  so  universally  accepted ;  nor  could  it  ever 
have  been  so  accepted  but  for  the  presence  in  all  schools  of  those 
who  did  remember,  and  who  spoke  what  they  knew.  All  the  greatest 
teachers  made  this  claim ;  we  have  seen  the  Buddha  make  it ;  we 
have  seen  it  made  by  Krishna ;  what  other  meaning  can  we  give  to 
those  mysterious  words :   Before  Abraham  was,  I  am  ? 


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T5he  THEOSOPHICAL  SOCIETY 

Publishing  Department,  244  Lenox  Avenue,  New  York,  N.  Y. 


KARMA:  Works  and  Wisdom 

By  CHARLES  JOHNSTON,  M.R.A.S.,  Bengal  Civil  Serv- 
ice, Retired.  Paper,  35  cents ;  cloth,  60  cents. 

A  lucid  and  comprehensive  explanation,  based  upon  the  author's  trans- 
lations from  the  original  Sanscrit.  It  embraces  the  history  and  develop- 
ment of  the  idea  which  gave  birth  to  the  term  Karma  in  the  minds  of  the 
world's  most  ancient  philosophers. 

THE  BHAGAVAD-GITA 

The  Book  of  Devotion,  being  Dialogues  between  Krishna, 
the  Hindu  Avatar,  and  Arjuna,  Prince  of  India,  with  an  intro- 
duction by  WILLIAM  Q.  JUDGE.  New  edition,  pocket 
size.     Flexible  leather,  side  stamp,  gilt  edges,  75  cts. 

In  this  Dialogue  is  represented  the  conversation  between  the  personal  self 
and  the  Divine  Consciousness  in  Man,  in  which  is  set  forth  the  Path  of 
Duty,  the  right  performance  of  Action,  and  final  Union  with  the  Divine. 
The  Bhagavad-Gita  has  been  studied  by  the  Philosophers  of  all  ages. 

THE  OCEAN  OF  THEOSOPHY 

By  WILLIAM  Q.  JUDGE.  With  portrait  of  the  author, 
154  pages.     Paper,  35  cts.;  cloth,  side  stamp,  gilt  top,  50  cts. 

Written  in  an  easy  and  popular  style,  this  book  gives  a  clear  and  system- 
atic statement  of  Theosophy,  unequaled  by  any  other  introductory  work. 
In  a  small  compass  it  conveys  a  surprising  amount  of  curious  and  valu- 
able information. 
It  is  well  suited  for  propaganda  work. 

THE  SERMON  ON  THE  MOUNT 

And  Other  Extracts  from  the  New  Testament.  By  JAMES 
M.  PRYSE.     86  pages,  wide  margins,  illustrated  cover. 

Paper,  25  cents;  cloth,  50  cents. 

A  verbatim  translation  from  the  Greek,  with  notes  on  the  Mystical  or 

Arcane  Sense. 

Contains  the  Sermon  on  the  Mount,  The  Coming  of  the  Christos,  The 

True  Path  of  Power,  A  Letter  of  Iakorbas,  A  Letter  of  Ioudas,  The 

Service  of  Right  Conduct. 

This  book  is  of  special  interest  to  students  of  Christian  Mysticism  and 

the  Occultism  of  the  Bible. 


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